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Class r Z _ 

Book_ 4 -I 


Copight N 0 ... 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 


I 










V 


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CONTACT AND OTHER STORIES 















CONTACT 

AND OTHER STORIES 

BY 

FRANCES NOYES HART 



GARDEN CITY NEW YORK 

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

1923 























COPYRIGHT, 1923 , BY 
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION 
INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN 

COPYRIGHT, 1920, IQ2I, 1923, BY THE PICTORIAL REVIEW COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT, ig2I, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 

COPYRIGHT, 1922, BY THE CCRTIS PUBLISHING COMPANY IN THE UNITED 
STATES AND GREAT BRITAIN 

COPYRIGHT, 1923, BY THE MCCALL COMPANY 

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES 
AT 

THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y. 

First Edition 

JUN -5 1923 

©C1A705696 ' 


TO MY FATHER 
FRANK BRETT NOYES 












CONTENTS 


“Contact!” . 
There Was a Lady 
Long Distance . 
Philip the Gay. 
Green Gardens 
Delilah . 

Her Grace . 


PAGE 

1 

35 

76 

108 

157 

177 

280 


The Honourable Tony 


264 






















CONTACT AND OTHER STORIES 


CONTACT 

AND OTHER STORIES 


“CONTACT! 




± 


first time she heard it was in the silk- 
hung and flower-scented peace of the little 
drawing room in Curzon Street. His sister 
Rosemary had wanted to come up to London to 
get some clothes—Victory clothes they called them 
in those first joyous months after the armistice, 
and decked their bodies in scarlet and silver, even 
when their poor hearts went in black—and Janet 
had been urged to leave her own drab boarding¬ 
house room to stay with the forlorn small butterfly. 
They had struggled through dinner somehow, and 
Janet had finished her coffee and turned the great 
chair so that she could watch the dancing fire (it 
was cool for May), her cloudy brown head tilted 
back against the rose-red cushion, shadowy eyes 
half closed, idle hands linked across her knees. She 
looked every one of her thirty years—and mortally 

tired—and careless of both facts. But she man- 

l 



2 


“ CONTACT /” 


aged an encouraging smile at the sound of Rose¬ 
mary’s shy, friendly voice at her elbow. 

“Janet, these are yours, aren’t they? Mummy 
found them with some things last week, and I 
thought that you might like to have them.” 

She drew a quick breath at the sight of the 
shabby packet. 

“Why, yes,” she said evenly. “That’s good of 
you, Rosemary. Thanks a lot.” 

“That’s all right,” murmured Rosemary diffi¬ 
dently. “Wouldn’t you like something to read? 
There’s a most frightfully exciting Western 
novel-” 

The smile took on a slightly ironical edge. 

“Don’t bother about me, my dear. You see, I 
come from that frightfully exciting West, and I 
know all about the pet rattlesnakes and the wildly 
Bohemian cowboys. Run along and play with 
your book; I’ll be off to bed in a few minutes.” 

Rosemary retired obediently to the deep chair 
in the corner, and with the smile gone but the irony 
still hovering, she slipped the cord off the packet. 
A meagre and sorry enough array; words had never 
been for her the swift, docile servitors that most 
people found them. But the thin gray sheet in 
her fingers started out gallantly enough—“Be¬ 
loved.” Beloved! She leaned far forward, drop¬ 
ping it with deft precision into the glowing pocket 



“CONTACTr 


3 


of embers. What next? This was more like; 
it began: “Dear Captain Langdon” in the small, 
contained writing that was her pride, and it went 
on soberly enough, “I shall be glad to have tea 
with you next Friday—not Thursday, because I 
must be at the hut then. It was stupid of me to 
have forgotten you; next time I will try to do bet¬ 
ter.” Well, she had done better the next time. 
She had not forgotten him again—never, never 
again. That had been her first letter; how ab¬ 
surd of Jerry, the magnificently careless, to have 
treasured it all that time, the miserable, stilted 
little thing! She touched it with curious fingers. 
Surely, surely he must have cared, to have cared 
so much for that! 

It seemed incredible that she hadn’t remem- 

i 

bered him at once when he came into the hut that 
second time. Of course she had only seen him for 
a moment and six months had passed, but he was 
so absurdly vivid, every inch of him, from the top 
of his shining, dark head to the heels of his shining, 
dark boots—and there were a great many inches! 
How could she have forgotten, even for a minute, 
those eyes dancing like blue fire in the brown 
young face, the swift, disarming charm of his smile, 
and, above all, his voice—how, in the name of 
absurdity, could any one who had once heard it ever 
forget Jeremy Langdon’s voice? Even now she 



4 


“CONTACT!” 


had only to close her eyes, and it rang out again, 
with its clipped British accent and its caressing 
magic, as un-English as any Provencal trouba¬ 
dour’s! And yet she had forgotten; he had had 
to speak twice before she had even lifted her 
head. 

“Miss America—oh, I say, she’s forgotten me, 
and I thought that I’d made such an everlasting 
impression!” The delighted amazement reached 
even her tired ears, and she had smiled wanly as 
she pushed the pile of coppers nearer to him. 

“Have you been in before? It’s stupid of me, 
but there are such hundreds of thousands of you, 
and you are gone in a minute, you see. That’s 
your change, I think.” 

“Hundreds of thousands of me, hey?” He had 
leaned across the counter, his face alight with mirth. 
“I wish to the Lord my angel mother could hear 
you—it’s what I’m for ever teilin’ her, though just 
between us, it’s stuff and nonsense. I’ve got a 
well-founded suspicion that I’m absolutely unique. 
You wait and see!” 

And she had waited—and she had seen! She 
stirred a little, dropped the note into the flames, 
and turned to the next, the quiet, mocking mouth 
suddenly tortured and rebellious. 

“No, you must be mad,” it ran, the trim writing 
strangely shaken. “How often have you seen me 


“ CONTACT /” 


5 


—five times? Do you know how old I am? How 
hard and tired and useless? No—no, a thousand 
times. In a little while we will wake up and find 
that we were dreaming.” 

That had brought him to her swifter than Fate, 
triumphant mischief in every line of his exultant 
face. “Just let those damn cups slip from your 
palsied fingers, will you? I’m goin’ to take your 
honourable age for a little country air—it may keep 
you out of the grave for a few days longer. Never 
can tell! No use your scowlin’ like that. The 
car’s outside, and the big chief says to be off with 
you. Says you have no more colour than a ban¬ 
shee, and not half the life—can’t grasp the fact that 
it’s just chronic antiquity. Fasten the collar 
about your throat—no, higher! Darlin’, darlin’, 
think of havin’ a whole rippin’ day to ourselves. 
You’re glad, too, aren’t you, my little stubborn 
saint?” 

Oh, that joyous and heart-breaking voice, run¬ 
ning on and on—it made all the other voices that 
she had ever heard seem colourless and unreal- 

“Darlin’ idiot, what do I care how old you are? 
Thirty, hey? Almost old enough to be an ances¬ 
tor! Look at me—no, look at me. Dare you to 
say that you aren’t mad about me!” 

Mad about him; mad, mad. She lifted her 
hands to her ears, but she could no more shut out 




6 “ CONTACT /” 

the exultant voice now than she could on that 
windy afternoon. 

“Other fellow got tired of you, did he? Good 
luck for us, what? You're a fearfully tiresome 
person, darlin’. It’s goin’ to take me nine tenths 
of eternity to tell you how tiresome you are. Give 
a chap a chance, won’t you? The tiresomest thing 
about you is the way you leash up that dimple of 
yours. No, by George, there it is! Janie, look 
at me-” 

She touched the place where the leashed dimple 
had hidden with a delicate and wondering finger— 
of all Jerry’s gifts to her, the most miraculous had 
been that small fugitive. Exiled now, for ever 
and for ever. 

“Are you cornin’ down to White Orchards next 
week-end? I’m off for France on the twelfth and 
you’ve simply got to meet my people. You’ll be 
insane about ’em; Rosemary’s the most beguilin’ 
flibbertigibbet, and I can’t wait to see you bein’ a 
kind of an elderly grandmother to her. What 
a bewitchin’ little grandmother you’re goin’ to be 
one of these days-” 

Oh, Jerry! Oh, Jerry, Jerry! She twisted in 
her chair, her face suddenly a small mask of in¬ 
credulous terror. No, no, it wasn’t true, it wasn’t 
true—never—never—never! And then, for the 
first time, she heard it. Far off but clear, a fine 




“CONTACTr 


7 


and vibrant humming, the distant music of wings! 
The faint, steady pulsing was drawing nearer and 
nearer—nearer still; it must be flying quite high. 
The letters scattered about her as she sprang to 
the open window; no, it was too high to see, and 
too dark, though the sky was powdered with stars, 
but she could hear it clearly, hovering and throb¬ 
bing like some gigantic bird. It must be almost 
directly over her head, if she could only see it. 

“It sounds—it sounds the way a humming-bird 
would look through a telescope,” she said half 
aloud, and Rosemary murmured sleepily but 
courteously, “What, Janet?” 

“Just an airplane; no, gone now. It sounded 
like a bird. Didn’t you hear it?” 

“No,” replied Rosemary drowsily. “We get so 
used to the old things that we don’t even notice 
them any more. Queer time to be flying.” 

“It sounded rather beautiful,” said Janet, her 
face still turned to the stars. “Far off, but so 
clear and sure. I wonder—I wonder whether it 
will be coming back?” 

Well, it came back. She went down to White 
Orchards with Rosemary for the following week¬ 
end, and after she had smoothed her hair and 
given a scornful glance at the pale face in the 
mirror, with its shadowy eyes and defiant mouth, 
she slipped out to the lower terrace for a breath 


8 


“ CONTACT /” 


of the soft country air. Half way down the flight 
of steps she stumbled and caught at the balustrade, 
and stood shaking for a moment, her face pressed 
against its rough surface. Once before she had 
stumbled on those steps, but it was not the balus¬ 
trade that had saved her. She could feel his arms 
about her now, holding her up, holding her close 
and safe. The magical voice was in her ears. 

“Let you go? I’ll never let you go! Poor little 
feet, stumblin’ in the dark, what would you do with¬ 
out Jerry? Time’s cornin’, you cheeky little devils, 
when you’ll come runnin’ to him when he whistles! 
No use try in’ to get away—you belong to him.” 

Oh, whistle to them now, Jerry—they would run 
to you across the stars! 

“How’d you like to marry me before I go back 
to-morrow? No? No accountin’ for tastes. Miss 
Abbott—lots of people would simply jump at it! 
All right, April, then. Birds and flowers and all 
that kind o’ thing—pretty intoxicatin’, what? 
No, keep still, darlin’ goose. What feller taught 
you to wear a dress that looks like roses and smells 
like roses and feels like roses? This feller? Lord 
help us, what a lovely liar!” 

And suddenly she found herself weeping help¬ 
lessly, desperately, like an exhausted child, shaken 
to the heart at the memory of the rose-coloured 
dress. 


“CONTACTr 


9 


“You like me just a bit, don’t you, funny, quiet 
little thing? But you’d never lift a finger to hold 
me; that’s the wonder of you—that’s why I’ll 
never leave you. No, not for heaven. You can’t 
lose me—no use tryin’.” 

But she had lost you, Jerry; you had left her, for 
all your promises, to terrified weeping in the hushed 
loveliness of the terrace, where your voice had 
turned her still heart to a dancing star, where your 
fingers had touched her quiet blood to flowers and 
flames and butterflies. She had believed you 
then. What would she ever believe again? And 
then she caught back the despairing sobs swiftly, 
for once more she heard, far off, the rushing of 
wings. Nearer—nearer—humming and singing 
and hovering in the quiet dusk. Why, it was over 
the garden! She flung back her head, suddenly 
eager to see it; it was a friendly and thrilling sound 
in all that stillness. Oh, it was coming lower— 
lower still—she could hear the throb of the pro¬ 
pellers clearly. Where was it? Behind those 
trees, perhaps? She raced up the flight of steps, 
dashing the treacherous tears from her eyes, strain¬ 
ing up on impatient tiptoes. Surely she could 
see it now! But already it was growing fainter— 
drifting steadily away, the distant hum growing 
lighter and lighter—lighter still- 

“Janet!” called Mrs. Langdon’s pretty, patient 




10 


“CONTACTr 


voice. “Dinner-time, dear! Is there any one 
with you?” 

“No one at all, Mrs. Langdon. I was just lis¬ 
tening to an airplane.” 

“An airplane? Oh, no, dear; they never pass 
this way any more. The last one was in October, 
I think--” 

The plaintive voice trailed off in the direction 
of the dining room and Janet followed it, a small, 
secure smile touching her lips. The last one had 
not passed in October. It had passed a few min¬ 
utes before, over the lower garden. 

She quite forgot it by the next week; she was 
becoming an adept at forgetting. That was all 
that was left for her to do! Day after day and 
night after night she had raised the drawbridge 
between her heart and memory, leaving the lonely 
thoughts to shiver desolately on the other side of 
the moat. She was weary to the bone of suffering, 
and they were enemies, for all their dear and 
friendly guise; they would tear her to pieces if she 
ever let them in. No, no, she was done with them. 
She would forget, as Jerry had forgotten. She 
would destroy every link between herself and the 
past, and pack the neat little steamer trunk neatly 
and bid these kind and gentle people good-bye, and 
take herself and her bitterness and her dulness 
back to the classroom in the Western university 



“CONTACTr 11 

town—back to the Romance languages. The 
Romance languages! 

She would finish it all that night, and leave as 
soon as possible. There were some trinkets to 
destroy, and his letters from France to burn; she 
would give Rosemary the rose-coloured dress— 
foolish, lovely little Rosemary, whom he had 
loved, and who was lying now fast asleep in the 
next room, curled up like a kitten in the middle of 
the great bed, her honey-coloured hair falling about 
her in a shining mist. She swept back her own 
cloud of hair resolutely, frowning at the candle-lit 
reflection in the mirror. Two desolate pools in 
the small, pale oval of her face stared back at her— 
two pools with something drowned in their lonely 
depths. Well, she would drown it deeper! 

The letters first; lucky that they still used can¬ 
dlelight! It would make the task much simpler— 
the funeral pyre already lighted. She moved one 
of the tall candelabra to the desk, sitting for a 
long time quite still, her chin cupped in her hands, 
staring down at the bits of paper. She could smell 
the wall-flowers under the window as though they 
were in the room; drenched in dew and moonlight,! 
they were reckless of their fragrance. All this 
peace and cleanliness and ordered beauty—what a 
ghastly trick for God to have played—to have 
taught her to adore them, and then to snatch them 


12 


“ CONTACT /” 


away! All about her, warm with candlelight, lay 
the gracious loveliness of the little room with its 
dark waxed furniture, its bright glazed chintz, 
its narrow bed with the cool linen sheets smelling 
of lavender, and its straight, patterned curtains— 
oh, that hateful, mustard-coloured den at home 
with its golden-oak day-bed! 

She wrung her hands suddenly in a little hunted 
gesture. How could he have left her to that, he 
who had sworn that he would never leave her? In 
every one of those letters beneath her linked fin¬ 
gers he had sworn it—in every one perjured—false 
half a hundred times. Pick up any one of them 
at random- 

“Janie, you darling stick, is ‘dear Jerry’ the best 
that you can do? You ought to learn French! 
I took a perfectly ripping French kid out to dinner 
last night—name’s Liane, from the Varieties—and 
she was calling me ‘mon grand cheri ’ before the 
salad, and ‘mon p’tit amour ’ before the green mint. 
Maybe that'll buck you up! And I’d have you 
know that she’s so pretty that it’s ridiculous, with 
black velvet hair that she wears like a little Orien¬ 
tal turban, and eyes like golden pansies, and a 
mouth between a kiss and a prayer, and a nice 
affable nature into the bargain. But I’m a ghastly 
jackass—I didn’t get any fun out of it at all—be¬ 
cause I really didn’t even see her. Under the 



“ CONTACT!” 


IS 


pink shaded candles to my blind eyes it seemed 
that there was seated the coolest, quietest, whitest 
little thing, with eyes that were as indifferent as 
my velvety Liane’s were kind, and mockery in her 
smile. Oh, little masquerader! If I could get 
my arms about you even for a minute—if I could 
kiss so much as the tips of your lashes—would 
you be cool and quiet and mocking then? Janie, 
Janie, rosy-red as flowers on the terrace and 
sweeter—sweeter—they’re about you now—they’ll 
be about you always!” 

Burn it fast, candle—faster, faster. Here’s 
another for you! 

“So the other fellow cured you of using pretty 
names, did he—you don’t care much for dear and 
darling any more? Bit hard on me, but for¬ 
tunately for you, Janie Janet, I’m rather a dab at 
languages, ’specially when it comes to ‘cozy 
names.’ Querida mi alma , douchka , Herzliebchen, 
carissima , and bien , bien-aimee , I’ll not run out of 
salutations for you this side of heaven—no, nor 
t’other. I adore the serene grace with which you 
ignore the ravishing Liane Haven’t you any 
curiosity at all, my Sphinx? No? Well, then, 
just to punish you, I’ll tell you all about it. She’s 
married to the best fellow in the world, a liaison 
officer working with our squadron—and she wor¬ 
ships the ground that he walks on and the air that 





14 


“ CONTACT '/” 


he occasionally flies in. So whenever I run up to 
the City of Light, en permission , I look her up, and 
take her the latest news—and for an hour, over the 
candles, we pretend that I am Maurice, and that 
she is Janie. Only she says that I don’t pretend 
very well—and it’s just possible that she’s right. 

“ Mon petit coeur et grand tresor , I wish that I 
could take you flying with me this evening. You’d 
be daft about it! Lots of it’s a rotten bore, of 
course, but there’s something in me that doesn’t 
live at all when I’m on this too, too solid earth. 
Something that lies there, crouched and dormant, 
waiting until I’ve climbed up into the seat, and 
buckled the strap about me and laid my hands on 
the ‘stick.’ It’s waiting—waiting for a word— 
and so am I. And I lean far forward, watching the 
figure toiling out beyond till the call comes back to 
me, clear and confident: ‘Contact, sir?’ And I 
shout back, as restless and exultant as the first 
time that I answered it: ‘Contact!’ 

“And I’m off—and I’m alive—and I’m free! 
Ho, Janie! That’s simpler than Abracadabra or 
Open Sesame, isn’t it? But it opens doors more 
magical than ever they swung wide, and something 
in me bounds through, more swift and eager than 
• any Aladdin. Free! I’m a crazy sort of a beggar, 
my little love—that same thing in me hungers and 
thirsts and aches for freedom. I go half mad 







“CONTACTr 


15 


when people or events try to hold me; you, wise 
beyond wisdom, never will. Somehow, between 
us, we’ve struck the spark that turns a mere piece 
of machinery into a wonder with wings; somehow, 
you are for ever setting me free. It is your voice, 
your voice of silver and peace, that’s eternally whis¬ 
pering ‘Contact!’ to me—and I am released, heart, 
soul, and body! And because you speed me on my 
way, Janie, I’ll never fly so far, I’ll never fly so 
long, I’ll never fly so high that I’ll not return to 
you. You hold me fast, for ever and for ever.” 

You had flown high and far indeed, Jerry—and 
you had not returned. For ever and for ever! 
Burn faster, flame! 

“My blessed child, who’s been frightening you? 
Airplanes are by all odds safer than taxis, and no 
end safer than the infernal duffer who’s been chaf¬ 
fing you would be if I could once get my hands on 
him. Damn fool! Don’t care if you do hate 
swearing; damn fools are damn fools, and there’s 
an end to it. All those statistics are sheer melo¬ 
dramatic rot; the chap who fired ’em at you prob¬ 
ably has all his money invested in submarines, and 
is fairly delirious with jealousy. Peg (did I ever 
formally introduce you to Pegasus, the best pur¬ 
suit-plane in the R. F. C.—or out of it?) Peg’s 
about as likely to let me down as you are! We’d 
do a good deal for each other, she and I; nobody 



1G 


“ CONTACT /” 


else can really fly her, the darling! But she’d go 
to the stars for me—and farther still. Never you 
fear—we have charmed lives, Peg and I—we 
belong to Janie. 

“I think that people make an idiotic row about 
dying, anyway. It’s probably jolly good fun, and 
I can’t see what difference a few years here would 
make if you’re going to have all eternity to play 
with. Of course you’re a ghastly little heathen, 
and I can see you wagging a mournful head over 
this already—but every time that I remember what 
a shocking sell the After Life (exquisite phrase!) 
is going to be for you, darling, I do a bit of head- 
wagging myself, and it’s not precisely mournful! 
I can’t wait to see your blank consternation, and 
you needn’t expect any sympathy from me . My 
very first words will be, ‘I told you so!’ Maybe 
I’ll rap them out to you with a table-leg! 

“What do you think of all this Ouija Planchette 
rumpus, anyway? I can’t for the life of me see 
why any one with a whole new world to explore 
should hang around chattering with this one. I 
know that I’d be half mad with excitement to get 
at the new job, and that I’d find re-assuring the 
loved ones (exquisite phrase number two) a hide¬ 
ous bore. Still, I can see that it would be nice 
from their selfish point of view! Well, I’m no 
ghost yet, thank God, nor yet are you—but if 


“ CONTACT /” 


17 


ever I am one. I’ll show you what devotion really is. 
I’ll come all the way back from heaven to play with 
foolish Janie, who doesn’t believe that there is one 
to come from. To foolish, foolish Janie, who will 
still be dearer than the prettiest angel of them all, 
no matter how alluringly her halo may be tilted 
or her wings ruffled. To Janie who. Heaven for¬ 
give him, will be all that one poor ghost has ever 
loved!” 

Had there come to him, the radiant and the 
confident, a moment of terrible and shattering 
surprise—a moment when he realized that there 
were no pretty angels with shining wings waiting 
to greet him—a moment when he saw before him 
only the overwhelming darkness, blacker and 
deeper than the night would be, when she blew 
out the little hungry flame that was eating up the 
sheet that held his laughter? Oh, gladly would 
she have died a thousand deaths to have spared 
him that moment! 

“My little Greatheart, did you think that I did 
not know how brave you are? You are the truest 
soldier of us all, and I, who am not much given to 
worship, am on my knees before that shy gallantry 
of yours, which makes what courage we poor duf¬ 
fers have seem a vain and boastful thing. When I 
see you as I saw you last, small and white and clear 
and brave, I can’t think of anything but the first 



18 


“ CONTACT /” 


crocuses at White Orchards, shining out, demure 
and valiant, fearless of wind and storm and cold— 
fearless of Fear itself. You see, you’re so very, 
very brave that you make me ashamed to be afraid 
of poetry and sentiment and pretty words—things 
of which I have a good, thumping Anglo-Saxon 
terror, I can tell you! It’s because I know what 
a heavenly brick you are that I could have killed 
that statistical jackass for bothering you; but I’ll 
forgive him, since you say that it’s all right. And 
so ghosts’ are the only thing in the world that 
frighten you—even though you know that there 
aren’t any. You and Madame de Stael, hey? ‘I 
do not believe in ghosts, but I fear them!’ It’s 
pretty painful to learn that the mere sight of one 
would turn you into a gibbering lunatic. Nice 
sell for an enthusiastic spirit who’d romped clear 
back from heaven to give you a pleasant surprise— 
I don’t think! Well, no fear, young Janie; I’ll 
find some way if I’m put to it—some nice, safe, 
pretty way that wouldn’t scare a neurasthenic 
baby, let alone the dauntless Miss Abbott. I’ll 
find-” 

Oh, no more of that; no more! She crushed the 
sheet in her hands fiercely, crumpling it into a little 
ball; the candle-flame was too slow. No, she 
couldn’t stand it—she couldn’t, she couldn’t, and 
there was an end to it. She would go raving mad 





“ CONTACT /” 


19 


—she would kill herself—she would- She lifted 

her head, wrenched suddenly back from that chaos 
of despair, alert and intent. There it was again, 
coming swiftly nearer and nearer from some im¬ 
measurable distance—down—down—nearer still— 
the very room was humming and throbbing with 
it, she could almost hear the singing in the wires. 
She swung far out over the window edge, searching 
the moon-drenched garden with eager eyes; 
surely, surely it would never fly so low unless it 
were about to land! Engine trouble, perhaps, 
though she could detect no break in the huge, 
rhythmic pulsing that was shaking the night. 
Still- 

“Rosmary!” she called urgently. “Rosemary, 
listen—is there a place where it can land?” 

“Where what can land?” asked a drowsy 
voice. 

“An airplane. It’s flying so low that it must 
be in some kind of trouble; do come and see!” 

Rosemary came pattering obediently toward her, 
a small docile figure, dark eyes misted with dreams, 
wide with amazement. 

“I must be nine tenths asleep,” she murmured 
gently. “Because I don’t hear a single thing, 
Janet. Perhaps-” 

“Hush—listen!” begged Janet, raising an imper¬ 
ative hand—and then her own eyes widened. 






20 


“CONTACT!” 


“Why—it’s gone!” There was a note of flat 
incredulity in her voice. “Heavens, how those 
things must eat up space! Not a minute ago it 
was fairly shaking this room, and now-” 

Rosemary stifled a yawn and smiled ingrati¬ 
atingly. 

“Perhaps you were asleep, too,” she suggested 
humbly. “I don’t believe that airplanes ever fly 
this way any more. Or it might have been that 
fat Hodges boy on his motorcycle; he does make 
the most dreadful racket. Oh, Janet, what a 
perfectly ripping night—do see!” 

They leaned together on the window-sill, 
silenced by the white and shining beauty that had 
turned the pleasant garden into a place of magic. 
The corners of Janet’s mouth lifted suddenly. 
How absurd people were! The fat Hodges boy 
and his motorcycle! Did they all regard her as 
an amiable lunatic, even little, friendly Rosemary, 
wavering sleepily at her side? It really was mad¬ 
dening. But she felt, amazingly enough, sud¬ 
denly quiet and joyous and indifferent—and pas¬ 
sionately glad that the wanderer from the skies had 
won safely through and was speeding home. 
Home! Oh, it was a crying pity that it need ever 
land; anything so fleet and strong and sure should 
fly for ever! But if they must rest, those beating 
wings—the old R. F. C. toast went singing through 



“CONTACT!” 


21 


her head and she flung it out into the moonlight, 
smiling—“Happy landings! Happy landings, 
you!” 

The next day was the one that brought to White 
Orchards what was to be known for many moons 
as “the Big Storm.” It had been gathering all 
afternoon, and by evening the heat had grown in¬ 
credible, even to Janet’s American and exigent 
standards. The smouldering copper sky looked 
as though it had caught fire from the world and 
would burn for ever; there was not so much as a 
whisper of air to break the stillness—it seemed as 
though the whole tortured earth were holding its 
breath, waiting to see what would happen next. 
Everyone had struggled through the day assuring 
one another that when evening came it would be all 
right, dangling the alluring thought of the cool 
darkness before each other’s hot and weary eyes; 
but the night proved even more outrageous than 
the day. To the little group seated on the ter¬ 
race, dispiritedly playing with their coffee, it 
seemed almost a personal affront. The darkness 
closed in on them, smothering, heavy, intolerable; 
they could feel its weight, as though it were some 
hateful and tangible thing. 

“Like—like black cotton wool,” explained Rose¬ 
mary, stirred to unwonted resentment. She had 
spent the day curled up in the largest Indian chair 



n “CONTACTr 

on the terrace, round-eyed with fatigue and in¬ 
credulity. 

“I honestly think that we must be dreaming,” 
she murmured to her feverish audience; “I do, 
honestly. Why, it’s only May , and we never, 
never—there was that day in August about five 
years ago that was almost as bad, though. D’you 
remember, Mummy?” 

“ It’s hardly the kind of thing that one is likely 
to forget, dear. Do you think that it is necessary 
for us to talk? I feel somehow that I could bear 
it much more easily if we kept quite quiet.” 

Janet stirred a little, uneasily. She hated silence, 
that terrible empty space waiting to be filled up 
with your thoughts—why, the idlest chatter 
spared you that. She hated the terrace, too—she 
closed her eyes to shut out the ugly darkness that 
was pressing against her; behind the shelter of 
her lids it was cooler and stiller, but open eyed or 
closed, she could not shut out memory. The very 
touch of the bricks beneath her feet brought back 
that late October day. She had been sitting 
curled up on the steps in the warm sunlight, with 
the keen, sweet air stirring her hair and sending 
the beech-leaves dancing down the flagged path; 
there had been a heavenly smell of burning from 
the far meadow, and she was sniffing it luxuriously, 
feeling warm and joyous and protected in Jerry’s 


“ CONTACT /” 


23 


great tweed coat, watching the tall figure swinging 
across from the lodge gate with idle, happy eyes— 
not even curious. It was not until he had almost 
reached the steps that she had noticed that he was 
wearing a foreign uniform—and even then she had 
promptly placed him as one of Rosemary’s in¬ 
numerable conquests, bestowing on him a friendly 
and inquiring smile. 

“Were you looking for Miss Langdon?” Even 
now she could see the courteous, grave young face 
soften as he turned quickly toward her, baring his 
dark head with that swift foreign grace that turns 
our perfunctory habits into something like a ritual. 

“But no,” he had said gently, “I was looking 
for you. Miss Abbott.” 

“Now will you please tell me how in the world 
you knew that I was Miss Abbott?” 

And he had smiled with his lips, not his eyes. 

“I should be dull indeed if that I did not know. 
I am Maurice Laurent, Miss Abbott.” 

And “Oh,” she had cried joyously, “Liane’s 
Maurice!” 

“ But yes—Liane’s Maurice. They are not here, 
the others? Madame Langdon, the little Miss 
Rosemary?” 

“No, they’ve gone to some parish fair, and I’ve 
been wicked and stayed home. Won’t you sit 
down and talk to me? Please!” 


24 


“ CONTACT /” 


“Miss Abbott, it is not to you that I must talk. 
What I have to say is indeed most difficult, and it 
is to Jeremy’s Janie that I would say it. May I, 
then? ” 

It had seemed to Jeremy’s Janie that the voice 
in which she answered him came from a great 
distance, but she never took her eyes from the 
grave and vivid face. 

“Yes. And quickly, please.” 

So he had told her, quickly, in his exquisitely 
careful English, and she had listened as attentively 
and politely, huddled up on the brick steps in the 
sunlight, as though he were running over the details 
of the last drive instead of tearing her life to pieces 
with every word. She remembered now that it 
hadn’t seemed real at all; if it had been to Jerry 
that these horrors had happened could she have 
sat there so quietly, feeling the colour bright in her 
cheeks, and the wind stirring in her hair, and the 
sunlight warm on her hands? Why, for less than 
this people screamed, and fainted, and went raving 
mad! 

“You say—that his back is broken?” 

“But yes, my dear,” Liane’s Maurice told her, 
and she had seen the tears shining in his gray eyes. 

“And he is badly burned?” 

“My brave Janie, these questions are not good 
to ask; not good, not good to answer. This I will 


“CONTACTr 


Z5 


tell you. He lives, our Jerry—and so dearly does 
he love you that he will drag back that poor body 
from hell itself, because it is yours, not his. This 
he has sent me to tell you, most lucky lady ever 
loved.” 

“You mean—that he isn’t going to die?” 

“I tell you that into those small hands of yours 
he has given his life. Hold it fast.” 

“Will he—will he get well?” 

“He will not walk again; but have you not swift 
feet to run for him?” 

And there had come to her, sitting on the terrace 
in the sunshine, an overwhelming flood of joy, 
reckless and cruel and triumphant. Now he was 
hers for ever, the restless wanderer, delivered to 
her bound and helpless, never to stray again. Hers 
to worship and serve and slave for, his troth to 
Freedom broken—hers at last! 

“I’m coming,” she had told the tall young 
Frenchman breathlessly. “Take me to him— 
please let’s hurry.” 

“ Ma pauvre petite , this is war. One does not 
come and go at will. God knows by what miracle 
enough red tape unwound to let me through to you, 
to bring my message and to take one back.” 

“What message, Maurice?” 

“That is for you to say, little Janie. He told 
me, ‘Say to her that she has my heart; if she needs 



26 


“CONTACT!” 


my body, I will live. Say to her that it is an ugly, 
broken, and useless thing; still, hers. She must use 
it as she sees fit. Say to her—no, say nothing more. 
She is my Janie, and has no need of words. Tell 
her to send me only one, and I will be content.’ 
For that one word, Janie, I have come many miles. 
What shall it be?” 

And she had cried out exultantly, “Why, tell 

him that I say-” But the word had died in 

her throat. Her treacherous lips had mutinied, 
and she had sat there, feeling the blood drain back 
out of her face, out of her heart—feeling her eyes 
turn black with terror while she fought with those 
stiffened rebels. Such a little word “Live!”— 
surely they could say that. Was it not what he 
was waiting for, lying far away and still, schooled 
at last to patience, the reckless and the restless? 
Oh, Jerry, Jerry, live! Even now she could feel her 
mind like some frantic little wild thing, racing, 
racing to escape Memory. What had he said 
to her? “You, wise beyond wisdom, will never 
hold me—you will never hold me—you will 
never-” 

And suddenly she had dropped her twisted 
hands in her lap and lifted her eyes to Jerry’s am¬ 
bassador. 

“Will you please tell him—will you please tell 
him that I say—‘Contact’?” 






“ CONTACT /” 


27 


“ Contact? ” He had stood smiling down at her, 
ironical and tender. “Ah, what a race! That is 
the prettiest word that you can find for Jerry? 
But then it means to come very close, to touch, 
that poor harsh word—there he must find what 
comfort he can. We, too, in aviation use that 
word; it is the signal that says—‘Now you can fly!’ 
You do not know our vocabulary, perhaps?” 

“I know very little.” 

“That is all then? No other message? He will 
understand, our Jerry?” 

And Janie had smiled—rather a terrible, small 
smile. 

“Oh, yes,” she told him. “He will understand. 
It is the word that he is waiting for, you see.” 

“I see.” But there had been a grave wonder in 
his voice. 

“Would it”— she had framed the words as 
carefully as though it were a strange tongue that 
she was speaking—“would it be possible to buy 
his machine? He wouldn’t want any one else to 
fly it.” 

“Little Janie, never fear. The man does not 
live who shall fly poor Peg again. Smashed to 
kindling-wood and burned to ashes, she has taken 
her last flight to the heaven for good and brave 
birds of war. Not enough was left of her to hold 
in your two hands.” 


28 


“CONTACT!” 


“Fm glad. Then that’s all, isn’t it? And 
thank you for coming.” 

“It is I who thank you. What was hard as 
death you have made easy. I had thought the 
lady to whom Jeremy Langdon gave his heart the 
luckiest creature ever born—now I think him that 
luckiest one.” The grave grace with which he 
had bent to kiss her hand made of the formal salu¬ 
tation an accolade. “My homage to you, Jerry’s 
Janie!” A quick salute, and he had turned on his 
heel, swinging off down the flagged path with that 
swift, easy stride past the sun-dial, past the lily- 
pond, past the beech trees—gone! For hours and 
hours after he had passed out of sight she had sat 
staring after him, her hands lying quite still in her 
lap—staring, staring—they had found her there 
when they came back, sitting where Rosemary was 
seated now. Why, there, on those same steps, a 

bare six months ago- Something snapped in 

her head, and she stumbled to her feet, clinging 
to the arm of her chair. 

“I can’t stand it!” she gasped. “No, no, it’s 
no use—I can’t, I tell you. I-” 

Rosemary’s arm was about her, Mrs. Langdon’s 
soft voice in her ears, a deeper note from Rose¬ 
mary’s engineer. 

“Oh, I say, poor girl! What is it, dear child— 
what’s the matter? Is it the heat, Janie? ” 





“CONTACT!” 


29 


“The heat!” She could hear herself laughing; 
frantic, hateful, jangling laughter that wouldn’t 
stop. “Oh, Jerry! Oh-h, Jerry, Jerry, Jerry!” 

“It’s this ghastly day. Let me get her some 
water, Mrs. Langdon. Don’t cry so, Janie— 
please, please don’t, darling.” 

“I c-can’t help it—I c-can’t-” She paused, 

listening intently, her hand closing sharply over 
Rosemary’s wrist. “Oh, listen, listen, there it 
comes again—I told you so!” 

“Thank Heaven,” murmured Mrs. Langdon 
devoutly, “I thought that it never was going to rise 
this evening. It’s from the south, too, so I 
suppose that it means rain.” 

“Rain?” repeated Janet vaguely. “Why in 
the world should it mean rain?” Her small, 
pale face looked suddenly brilliant and enchanted, 
tilted up to meet the thunderous music that was 
swinging nearer and nearer. ”Oh, do listen, 
you people! This time it’s surely going to 
land!” 

Rosemary stared at her blankly. “Land? 
What are you talking about, Janie?” 

“My airplane—the one that you said was the 
fat Hodges boy on a motorcycle! Is there any 
place near here that it can make a landing? ” 

“Darling child”—Mrs. Langdon’s gentle voice 
was gentler than ever—“darling child, it’s this 



30 


“CONTACTr 


wretched heat. There isn’t any airplane, dear; 
it’s just the wind rising in the beeches.” 

“The wind?” Janet laughed aloud; they really 
were too absurd. “Why, Mrs. Langdon, you can 
hear the engines, if you’ll only listen! You can 
hear them, can’t you, Mr. Bain?” 

The young engineer shook his head. “No plane 
would risk flying with this storm coming, Miss 
Abbott. There’s been thunder for the last hour 
or so, and it’s getting nearer, too. It’s only the 
wind, I think.” 

“Oh, you’re laughing at me; of course, of course 
you hear it. Why, it’s as clear as—as clear as-” 

Her voice trailed o.T into silence. Quite sud¬ 
denly, without any transition or warning, she 
knew. She could feel her heart stand perfectly 
still for a minute, and then plunge forward in mad 
flight—oh, it knew, too, that eager heart! She 
took her hand from the arm of the chair, releasing 
Rosemary’s wrist very gently. 

“Yes, of course, it’s the heat,” she said quietly. 
She must be careful not to frighten them, these 
kind ones. “If you don’t mind, Mrs. Langdon, 
I think that I’ll go down to the gate to watch the 
storm burst. No, please, don’t any of you come; 
I’ll promise to change everything if I get caught— 
yes, everything! I won’t be long; don’t wait for 

99 


me. 



“ CONTACT1" 


31 


She walked sedately enough until she came to 
the turn in the path, but after that she ran, only 
pausing for a minute to listen breathlessly. Oh, 
yes—following, following, that gigantic music! 
How he must be laughing at her now, blind, deaf, 
incredulous little fool that she had been, to doubt 
that Jerry would find a way! But where could 
he land? Not in the garden—not at the gates— 
oh, now she had it—the far meadow. She turned 
sharply; it was dark, but the path must be here. 
Yes, this was the wicket gate; her groping 
fingers were quite steady; they found the latch, 
released it—the gate swung to behind her flying 
footsteps. “Oh, Jerry, Jerry!” sang her heart. 
Why hadn’t she worn the rose-coloured frock? It 
was she who would be a ghost in that trailing 
white thing. To the right here; yes, there was the 
hawthorn hedge—only a few steps more—oh, now! 

She stood as still as a small statue, not moving, 
not breathing, her hands at her heart, her face 
turned to the black and torn sky. Nearer, nearer, 
circling and darting and swooping; the gigantic 
humming grew louder—-louder still—it swept 
about her thunderously, so close that she clapped 
her hands over her ears, but she stood her ground, 
exultant and undaunted. Oh, louder still—and 
then suddenly the storm broke. All the winds 
and the rains of the world were unleashed, and fell 




32 


“ CONTACT /” 


howling and shrieking upon her; she staggered un¬ 
der their onslaught, drenched to the bone, her 
dress whipping frantically about her, blinded and 

f 

deafened by that tumultuous clamour. She had 
only one weapon against it—laughter—and she 
laughed now, straight into its teeth. And as 
though hell itself must yield to mirth, the fury 
wavered—failed—sank to muttering. But Janie, 
beaten to her knees and laughing, never even heard 
it die. 

44 Jerry?"’ she whispered into the darkness, 
“Jerry?” 

Oh, more wonderful than wonder, he was there! 
She could feel him stir, even if she could not hear 
him; so close was he that if she*even reached out 
her hand, she could touch him. She stretched it 
out eagerly, but there was nothing there—only a 
small, remote sound of withdrawal, as though 
someone had moved a little. 

“You’re afraid that I’ll be frightened, aren’t 
you?” she asked wistfully. “I wouldn’t be—I 
wouldn’t—please come back! ” 

He was laughing at her, she knew, tender and 
mocking and caressing; she smiled back, tremu¬ 
lously. 

“You’re thinking, ‘I told you so!’ Have you 
come far to say it to me?” 

Only that little stir; the wind was rising again. 


“ CONTACT /” 33 

“Jerry, come close—come closer still. What are 
you waiting for, dear and dearest?” 

This time there was not even a stir to answer 
her; she felt suddenly cold to the heart. What 
had he always waited for? 

“You aren’t waiting—you aren’t waiting to go?” 
She fought to keep the terror out of her voice, but 
it had her by the throat. “Oh, no, no, you can’t 
—not again! Jerry, Jerry, don’t go away and 
leave me; truly and truly I can’t stand it—truly!” 

She wrung her hands together desperately; she 
was on her knees to him—did he wish her to go 
lower still? Oh, she had never learned to beg! 

Not a sound, not a stir, but well she knew that 
he was standing there, waiting. She rose slowly to 
her feet. 

“Very well—you’ve won,” she said hardly. 
“Go back to your saints and seraphs and angels; 
I’m beaten. I was mad to think that you ever 
cared—go back!” 

She turned, stumbling, the sobs tearing at her 
throat; she had gone several steps before she real¬ 
ized that he was following her—and all the hard¬ 
ness and bitterness and despair fell from her like 
a cloak. 

“Oh, Jerry,” she whispered, “Jerry, darling, I’m 
so sorry. And you’ve come so far—just to find 
this! What is it that you want; can’t you tell me? 



34 


“CONTACT!” 


She waited tense and still, straining eyes and ears 
for her answer—but it was not to eyes or ears that 
it came. 

“Oh, of course!” she cried clearly. “Of course, 

/ 

my wanderer! Ready ? ’ 5 

She stood poised for a second, head thrown 
back, arms flung wide, a small figure of Victory, 
caught in the flying wind. 

And, “Contact, Jerry!” she called joyously into 
the darkness. “ Contact! ” 

There was a mighty whirring, a thunder and a 
roaring above the storm. She stood listening 
breathlessly to it rise and swell, and then grow 

fainter—fainter still—dying, dying—dying- 

But Janie, her face turned to the storm-swept 
sky, was smiling at the stars which shone behind 
it. For she had sped her wanderer on his way— 
she had not failed him! 




THERE WAS A LADY 


T HERE is one point on which Larry Bene¬ 
dick’s best friend and worst enemy and a 
_ lot of other less emphatic individuals are 

thoroughly and cordially agreed. Ask his closest 
female relative or his remotest business acquaint¬ 
ance or the man who plays an occasional hand of 
auction with him at the club why Benedick has 
never married, and they will one and all yield to 
sardonic mirth, and assure you that the woman 
who could interest that imperturbable individual 
has not yet been born—that he is without excep¬ 
tion the coldest-hearted, hardest-headed bachelor 
who has ever driven fluttering debutantes and 
radiant ladies from the chorus into a state of utter 
and abject despair—that romance is anathema 
to him and sentiment an abomination. 

“Benedick!” they will chorus with convincing 
unanimity. “My dear fellow, he’s been immune 
since birth. He’s never given any girl that lived or 
breathed a second thought—it’s extremely doubt¬ 
ful if he ever gave one a first. You can say what 
you please about him, but this you can take as a 

35 


36 


THERE WAS A LADY 


fact; you know one man who is going down to the 
grave as single as the day he was born.” 

Well, you can take it as a fact if you care to, and 
it’s more than likely that you and the rest of the 
world will be right. Certainly, no one would ever 
have called him susceptible, even at the age when 
any decent, normal young cub is ready to count the 
world well lost for an eyelash. But not our 
Benedick—no, long before the gray steel had 
touched the blue of his eyes and the black of his 
hair he had apparently found a use for it in an 
absolutely invulnerable strong box for what he 

I 

was pleased to call his heart. Then as now, he 
had faced his world with curled lips and cool 
eyes—graceful and graceless, spoiled, arrogant, 
and indifferent, with more money and more 
brains and more charm and a better conceit of 
himself than any two men should have—and a 
wary and sceptical eye for the charming creatures 
who circled closer and closer about him. The 
things that he used to think and occasionally say 
about those circling enchantresses were certainly 
unromantic and unchivalrous to a degree. Rather 
an intolerable young puppy, for all his brilliant 
charm—and the years have not mellowed him to 
any perceptible extent. Hardly likely to fall 
victim to the wiles of any lady, according to his 
worst enemy and his best friend and the world 


THERE WAS A LADY 37 

in general. No, hardly. But there was a 
ladv. . . . 

4 / 

It wasn’t yesterday that he first saw her—and it 
wasn’t a hundred years ago, either. It was at 
Raoul’s; if you are one of the large group of ap¬ 
parently intelligent people whose mania consists 
in believing that there is only one place in the world 
that any one could possibly reside in, and that that 
place is about a quarter of a mile square and a 
mile and and a half long and runs up from a street 
called Forty-second on an island called Manhattan, 
you undoubtedly know Raoul’s. Not a tea room— 
Heaven save the mark! Not a restaurant—God 
forbid! Something between the two; a small room, 
clean and shabby, fragrant with odours more 
delectable than flowers. No one is permitted to 
smoke at Raoul’s, not even ladies, because the 
light blue haze might disturb the heavenly aroma, 
at once spiced and bland, that broods over the 
place like a benediction. Nothing quite like it 
anywhere else in America, those who have been 
there will tell you; nothing quite like it anywhere 
else in the world. It costs fine gold to sit at one of 
the little round tables in the corner, but mere gold 
cannot pay for what you receive. For to Raoul 
the preparation of food is an art and a ceremony 
and a ritual and a science—not a commercial enter¬ 
prise. The only thing that he purchases with 



38 


THERE WAS A LADY 


your gold is leisure in which to serve you better. 
So who are you to grudge it to him? 

Larry Benedick lunched there every day of his 
life, when he was in New York, heedless of a steady 
shower of invitations. He lived then in one of 
those coveted apartments not a stone’s throw 
from Raoul’s brown door—a luxurious box of a 
place that one of the charming creatures (who 
happened to be his sister-in-law) had metamor¬ 
phosed into a bachelor’s paradise, so successfully 
that anv bachelor should have frothed at the 

t/ 

mouth with envy at the mere sight of it. 

It had a fair-sized living room, with very mascu¬ 
line crash curtains, darned in brilliant colours, and 
rough gray walls and an old Florentine chest skill¬ 
fully stuffed with the most expensive phonograph 
on the market, and rows and rows of beautifully 
bound books. There was a deep gray velvet sofa 
with three Chinese-red cushions in front of the 
small black fireplace (of course it wasn’t possible 
to light a fire in it without retiring from the apart¬ 
ment with a wet towel tied around the head, crawl¬ 
ing rather rapidly on the hands and knees because 
all the first-aid books state that any fresh air will 
be near the floor—but what of that? After all, 
you can’t have everything!)—and there were 
wrought-iron lamps that threw the light at exactly 
the right angle for reading, and very good English 


THERE WAS A LADY 


39 


etchings and very gay Viennese prints in red 
lacquer frames, and a really charming old Venetian 
mirror over the mantel. It was a perfect room 
for a fastidious young man, and Benedick loathed 
it with an awful loathing. 

“All the elusive charm of a window in a furni¬ 
ture shop,” he remarked pensively to his best 
friend—but at least he refrained from destroying 
the pretty sister-in-law’s transports of altruistic 
enthusiasm, and left it grimly alone, keeping his 
eyes averted from its charms as frequently as 
possible, and leaving for South Carolina or north¬ 
ern Canada on the slightest provocation—or else 
swinging off to Raoul’s at twelve o’clock with a 
feeling of profound relief, when what he fantasti¬ 
cally referred to as “business” kept him chained 
to New York and the highly successful living room. 

“Business” for Benedick consisted largely of a 
series of more or less amicable colloquies with a 
gray-faced, incisive gentleman in a large, dark, 
shining office, and the even more occasional gift of 
his presence at those convivial functions known as 
board meetings. His father, long dead, had been 
imprudent enough to sow the wind of financial 
speculation, and his unworthy son was now lan¬ 
guidly engaged in reaping a whirlwind of cou¬ 
pons and dividends. It is painful to dwell on 
so rudimentary a lack of fair play on the part of 


40 


THERE WAS A LADY 


Fate, though Benedick occasionally did dwell on it, 
with a sardonic grin at the recollection of the mod¬ 
est incomes received by the more prudent and 
thrifty members of the family. He made what 
atonement he could for his father’s unjustifiable 
success by a series of astoundingly lavish gifts, 
however, and wasted the rest of it more or less 
successfully. 

“Business” had kept him in town on that 
March day when he first saw her. He had ar¬ 
rived at Raoul’s doorstep at exactly five minutes 
past twelve; he lunched early, because he was a 
disciple of the Continental schedule, and it also 
avoided interruptions from over-fervent friends 
who frequented the place. The pretty cashier 
with her red cheeks and her elaborate Gallic coif¬ 
fure bestowed her usual radiant smile on him, and 
Benedick smiled back, with a swift response that 
many a debutante would have given a large piece 
of her small soul to obtain. Jules, the sallow 
and gentle-eyed, pulled out the little round 
chair with its padded cushions, pushed in the 
little round table with its threadbare and spotless 
cloth, and bent forward with pencil poised, the 
embodiment of discreet and eager interest. 

“ Bon jour, monsieur! Monsieur dSsire? -” 

This, after all, was nearer a home than any¬ 
thing that Larry Benedick had known for many a 



THERE WAS A LADY 


41 


weary year—this warm and peaceful corner, with 
old Jules and young Genevieve spreading friendli¬ 
ness all about him, with Raoul out in the tiled and 
copper-hung kitchen, alert to turn his skill to ser¬ 
vice. Monsieur desired? Well, kidneys flamboy¬ 
ant, perhaps—and then some artichokes with 
Raoul’s Hollandaise—and the little curled pan¬ 
cakes with orange and burnt sugar in the chafing- 
dish. Demi-tasse, of course, and Benedictine. 
Not yesterday, you see, that March afternoon!— 
Jules slipped away, as elated as though he were 
bearing with him great good tidings, and the brown- 
and-gray kitten came out from under the table, 
tapping at the cuff of his trousers with an im¬ 
perious paw, and he had a smile for it, too. Here 
in this tranquil space Monsieur had all that he de¬ 
sired, had he not? Surely, all. He bent forward 
to stroke the pink nose of his enterprising visitor, 
the smile deepening until the dark face was sud¬ 
denly young—and the brown door opened and she 
came in. 

Benedick knew quite well that it was a raw and 
abominable day outside—but he could have 
sworn that he looked up because the room was sud¬ 
denly full of the smell of pear blossoms, and lilacs, 
and the damp moss that grows beside running 
brooks—and that he felt the sunlight on his hands. 
There she stood, straight and slim, in her rough 



42 


THERE WAS A LADY 


green tweed, with her sapphire-blue scarf and the 
sapphire-blue feather in the little tweed hat that 
she had pulled down over the bright wings of her 
hair, her face as fresh and gay as though she had 
just washed it in that running brook, her lovely 
mouse-coloured eyes soft and mischievous, as 
though she were keeping some amusing secret. 
There was mud on her high brown boots, and she 
was swinging a shining new brief case in one bare 
hand. Benedick stared at that hand incredu¬ 
lously. It wasn’t possible that anything real 
could be so beautiful; velvet white, steel strong, 
fine and slim and flexible—such a hand Ghirlan- 
daijo’s great ladies of the Renaissance lifted to 
their hearts—such a hand a flying nymph on a 
Grecian frieze flung out in quest of mercy. And 
yet there it was, so close to him that if he stretched 
out his fingers he could touch it! 

The owner of this white wonder stood poised for 
a moment, apparently speculating as to whether 
this was the most perfect place in the world in 
which to lunch; she cast a swift glance of appraisal 
about the shadowed room with its hangings and 
cushions of faded peacock-blue, with its coal fire 
glowing and purring in the corner and its pots 
of pansies sitting briskly and competently along 
the deep window-sills; she gave a swift nod of 
recognition, as though she had found something 



THERE WAS A LADY 


43 


that she had long been seeking, and slipped lightly 
into the chair at the table next to Benedicks. 
Her flying eyes had brushed by the startled won¬ 
der of his face as though it had not been there, and 
it was obvious that he was still not there, in so far 
as the lady was concerned. She pounced exul¬ 
tantly on the carte du jour and gave it her rapt and 
undivided attention; when Jules arrived carrying 
Benedick’s luncheon as carefully as though it were 
a delicate and cherished baby she was ready and 
waiting for him—and Jules succumbed instantly 
to the hopeful friendliness of her voice. 

But certainly, Mademoiselle could have sole 
bonne femme and potatoes allumettes, and a 
small salad— oui, oui, entendu—bien fatiguee, that 
salad, with a soupgon of garlic in a crust of bread, 
and the most golden of oils—yes, and a souffle of 
chocolate with a demi-tasse in which should be just 
one dash of cognac—oh, rest assured of the quality 
of the cognac. Ah, it was to be seen that Made¬ 
moiselle was fine gourmet —which was, alas, not too 
common a quality in ces dames! Fifteen minutes 
would not be too long to wait, no? The potatoes 
— bon, bon —Mademoiselle should see. Jules trot¬ 
ted rapidly off in the direction of the kitchen, and 
Benedick’s luncheon grew cold before him while 
he watched to see what the miracle at the table 
beside him would do next. 



44 


THERE WAS A LADY 


How long, how long you had waited for her. 
Benedick the cynic—so long that you had forgot¬ 
ten how lovely she would be. After all, it had not 
been you who had waited; it had been a little 
black-headed, blue-eyed dreamer, fast asleep these 
many years—you had forgotten him, too, had you 
not? He was awake now with a vengeance, star¬ 
ing through your incredulous eyes at the lovely 
lady of his dreams, sitting, blithe and serene, 
within hand’s touch—the lovely lady who was 
not too proud to have mud on her boots and who 
actually knew what to order for lunch. All the 
girls that Benedick had ever known from the 
fuzzy-headed little ladies in the chorus to the 
sleek-locked wives of his best friend and his worst 
enemy, ordered chicken a la King and fruit salad 
and indescribable horrors known as maple walnut 
sundaes and chocolate marshmallow ice cream. 
But not this lady—oh, not this one! He leaned 
forward, breathless; what further enchantments 
had she in store? Well, next she took off her hat, 
tossing it recklessly across the table, and the 
golden wings of her hair sprang out alive and joy¬ 
ous, like something suddenly uncaged—and then 
she was uncaging something else, a shabby brown¬ 
ish red book, prying it out of the depths of the new 
brief case as though she could hardly wait; he 
could see from the way that the white hands 


THERE WAS A LADY 


45 


touched it that they loved it dearly—that they had 
loved it dearly for a long, long time. It flew open, 
as though it remembered the place itself, and she' 
dipped her bright head to it, and was off! Bene¬ 
dick pushed his untouched plate far from him, 
leaning forward across the table, caution and 
courtesy and decent reserve clean forgotten. 
What was she reading that could make her face 
dance like that—all her face, the gold-tipped 
lashes and the brave lips, and the elusive fug¬ 
itive in the curve of the cheek turned toward 
him, too fleeting to be a dimple—too enchanting 
not to be one—what in the name of heaven was she 
reading? If only she would move her hand a 
little—ah! 

Something came pattering eagerly toward him 
out of the printed page—a small, brisk, portly 
individual with long ears and a smart waist¬ 
coat—his heart greeted it with a shout of in¬ 
credulous delight. By all that was wonderful, 
the White Rabbit! The dim room with its 
round tables faded, faded—Benedick the cynic. 
Benedick the sceptic, faded with it—he was back 
in another room, warm with firelight and bright 
with lamplight, in which a small black-headed 
boy sat upright in a crib, and listened to a lady 
reading from a red-brown book—a curly-headed 
lady, soft-voiced, soft-handed, and soft-eyed, who 






46 


THERE WAS A LADY 


for ten enchanted years had read the lucky little 
boy to sleep; he had never believed in fairy tales 
again, after that soft voice had trailed off into 
silence. But now—now it was speaking once 
more—and once more he believed! 

“Oh, the Duchess, the Duchess! Oh, my dear paws! Oh, 
my fur and whiskers! She’ll have me arrested as sure as 
ferrets are ferrets! Where can I have dropped them?” 

The little boy was leaning forward, flushed and enchanted. 

“Well, but motherie darling, where could he have dropped 
them? Where could he have dropped those gloves?” 


* 4 Monsieur desire ? 9 9 

Benedick stared blankly at the solicitous coun¬ 
tenance, wrenching himself back across the years. 
Monsieur desired—ah, Monsieur desired—Mon¬ 
sieur desired- 

He sat very still after that, until she had sipped 
the last drop of black coffee out of the little blue 
cup, until she had pulled the hat down over the 
golden wings and wrapped the sapphire scarf 
about her white throat and wedged “Alice” 
back into the brief case, and smiled at Jules, and 
smiled at Genevieve, and smiled at the gray 
kitten, and vanished through the brown door. 

He sat even stiller for quite a while after she 
had gone; and then suddenly bounded to his feet 
and flung out of the room before the startled 




THERE WAS A LADY 


47 


Jules could ask him whether there was not 
something that he preferred to the untouched 
Benedictine. 

It was drizzling in the gray street and he turned 
his face to it as though it were sunshine; he glanced 
in the direction of the large dark office, and dis¬ 
missed it with a light-hearted shrug. Business- 
business, by the Lord! Not while there was still 
a spot to dream in undisturbed. He raced up the 
apartment-house stairs three at a time, scorning 
the elevator, and was in the living room before 
the petrified Harishidi could do more than leap 
goggle-eyed from his post by the Florentine chest. 
Harishidi had obviously been indulging his passion 
for Occidental music, though you would not have 
gathered it from the look of horrified rebuke that 
he directed at the Renaissance treasure’s spirited 
rendition of the “Buzz Town Darkies’ Ball.” The 
look conveyed the unmistakable impression that 
Harishidi had done everything in his power to 
prevent the misguided instrument from breaking 
out in this unfortunate manner during his master’s 
absence, but that his most earnest efforts had 
proved of no avail. Benedick, however, was un¬ 
impressed. 

“For the love of God, shut off that infernal 
noise! 

Harishidi flung himself virtuously on the of- 


48 


THERE WAS A LADY 


fending treasure, and Benedick stood deliberating 
for a moment. 

“Bring me the records out of the drawer—no, 
over to the couch—I’m half dead for sleep after 
that damned party. Get my pipe; the briar, 
idiot. Matches. This the lot Mrs. Benedick 
sent?” 

Harishidi acknowledged it freely, and Benedick 
shuffled rapidly through the black disks. Cello 
rendition of “Eli Eli”; the Smith Sisters in a 
saxophone medley; highly dramatic interpretation 
of the little idyll from Samson et Delilah; “Kiss 
Your Baby and Away We Go” specially rendered 
by Dolpho, the xylophone king—yes, here it was. 

“An Elizabethan Song, sung by Mr. Roger Gra- 
hame of the Santa Clara Opera Company.” 

“Here you are, Hari; put this on your infernal 
machine. Take the telephone off the hook and 
give me another of those cushions. Where’s an 
ashtray? All right—let her rip!” 

“I play her now?” demanded the incredulous 
Harishidi. 

“You play her now, and you keep right on play¬ 
ing her until I tell you to stop. What’s more, if 
I hear another word out of you, you’re fired. All 
right—what are you waiting for? Go ahead!” 

The quiet room was suddenly flooded with 
grace and gallantry and a gay melancholy; a light 


THERE WAS A LADY 


49 


tenor voice singing easily and happily of something 
that was not joy—and was not sorrow— 

“There was a lady, fair and kind. 

Was never face so pleased my mind; 

I did but see her, passing by. 

And yet I love her till I die. 

Till—I—die-” 

Fair and kind—a lady with gold wings for hair 
and gray velvet for eyes—a lady who knew what 
to have for lunch and who read “Alice in Wonder¬ 
land”—a lady who was tall and slim, and had a 
mouth like a little girl, and mud on her high boots 
—white-handed and white-throated—pear blos¬ 
soms in the sunlight—fair and kind— 

“Her gesture, motion, and her smile. 

Her wit, her voice, my heart beguile. 

Beguile my heart, I know not why, 

And yet I love her till I die. 

Till—I—die.” 

Her grace, her voice—a lady who walked as 
though she were about to dance—a lady who 
spoke as though she were about to sing—fair and 
kind—gold and ivory—he had seen her before— 
she lived in a castle and her hair hung down to her 
heels—he had ridden by on a black horse and she 
had thrown him a rose—a castle by the sea—a 
castle behind a hedge of thorns—a castle in a 








50 


THERE WAS A LADY 


dreaming wood—but he had found her and waked 
her with a kiss—no, no, it was he who had been 
asleep—a long time—a long time asleep—he 
wanted to hear the end of the story, but he was so 
warm and happy, it was hard to keep awake—the 
firelight made strange shadows. . . 

“And so they both lived happily ever after!” 

“Then he did find her, Motherie?” 

“Of course, of course, he found her. Sleepy Head.” 

“Ever, ever after, Motherie?” 

“Ever, ever after, little boy.” . . . 


Fair and kind, Golden Hair, smiling in the fire¬ 
light—smile again—ever after, she said—ever, ever 
after.... 

The next day he was at Raoul’s at a quarter to 
twelve, and when Jules asked what Monsieur de¬ 
sired, he told him to bring anything, it made no 
difference to him! The stupefied Jules departed 
to the kitchen, where he was obliged to remain 
seated for several moments, owing to a slight touch 
of vertigo, and Monsieur sat unmolested in his 
chair in the corner, his eyes fastened on the brown 
door as though they would never leave it. He 
was still sitting there, feverish and preoccupied, 
half an hour later, having dutifully consumed 
everything that Jules put before him without 





THERE WAS A LADY 


51 


once removing his eyes from the door. It wasn’t 
possible—it wasn’t possible that she wouldn’t 
come again. Fate could not play him so scurvy a 
trick; but let him lay eyes on her just once more, 
and he would take no further chances with Fate! 
He would walk up to her the second that she 
crossed the threshold, and demand her name and 

address and telephone number and occupation- 

And the door opened, and she came in, and he sat 
riveted to his chair while she bestowed a bunch of 
violets the size of a silver dollar on the enchanted 
Genevieve, a smile of joyous complicity on the in¬ 
fatuated Jules, and a rapturous pat on the gray 
kitten. After a while he transferred his gaze from 
the door to the table next to him, but otherwise he 
did not stir. He was thinking a great many 
things very rapidly—unflattering and derisive 
comments on the mentality of one Larry Benedick. 
Idiot—ass! As though any lady who held her 
bright head so high would not disdain him out of 
measure if she could get so much as a glimpse into 
the depths of his fatuous and ignoble mind. Ask 
her for her address indeed! His blood froze at the 
thought. 

The lady, in the meantime, had ordered lunch 
and discarded her hat and pried another treasure 
from the brief case; this time it was brown and 
larger, and she held it so that Benedick could see, 




52 


THERE WAS A LADY 


the title without irreparably ruining his eyes. 
44 Tommy and Grizel”—the unspeakable Tommy! 
She was reading it with breathless intensity, too, 
and a look on her face that struck terror to his 
heart, a look at once scornful and delighted and 
disturbed, as though Tommy himself were sitting 
opposite her. So this—this w~as the kind of fellow 
that she liked to lunch with—a sentimental, 
posturing young hypocrite, all arrogance and 
blarney—it was incredible that she couldn’t see 
through him! What magic had this worthless idiot 
for ladies? 

Benedick glared at the humble-looking brown 
volume as though he would cheerfully rip the 
heart out of it. He continued to glare until the 
white hands put it back into the brief case with a 
lingering and regretful touch, and carried it away 
through the door; no sooner had it closed than he 
jammed on his hat and brushed rudely by the 
smiling Genevieve and out into the wind-swept 
street. There he paused, staring desperately 
about him, but the sapphire feather was nowhere 
to be seen, and after a moment he started off at a 
tremendous pace for his apartment, where he pro¬ 
ceeded to keep his finger on the elevator bell for a 
good minute and a half, and scowled forbiddingly 
at the oblivious elevator boy for seven stories, 
and slammed the door of the living room so 


THERE WAS A LADY 53 

vigorously that the red-lacquered frames leapt on 
the wall. 

He crossed the room in three lengthy strides, and 
slammed his bedroom door behind him even more 
vigorously. The bedroom was exactly half the 
size of the tiled bathroom, so that the artistic 
sister-in-law had only been able to wedge in a 
Renaissance day-bed and a painted tin scrap bas¬ 
ket—but Benedick found it perfectly satisfactory, 
as she had permitted him to use books instead of 
wall-paper. All the ones that she considered too 
shabby for the living room rose in serried ranks to 
the high ceiling—Benedick had substituted a nice 
arrangement of green steps instead of a chair, and 
had discovered that he could put either these or the 
scrap basket in the bathroom, if it was necessary 
to move around. He mounted the steps now, and 
snatched a brown volume from its peaceful niche 
on the top shelf next to “Sentimental Tommy,” 
climbed down and sat on the Renaissance day-bed, 
wrenched the book open so violently that he nearly 
broke its back, and read about what happened to 
Tommy on the last few pages—served him damned 
well right, too, except that hanging was too good 
for him. Sentiment! Sentiment was a loath¬ 
some thing, not to be borne for a moment. 

The third time that he read it he felt a little bet¬ 
ter. and he got up and kicked the scrap basket hard, 


54 


THERE WAS A LADY 


and telephoned to the incisive gentleman in the 
office that he wouldn’t be around because he had 
neuralgia and phlebitis and a jumping toothache, 
and telephoned his ravished sister-in-law that he’d 
changed his mind and would be around for dinner 
at eight if she’d swear to seat him next to a bru¬ 
nette. Subsequently he was so attentive to the 
brunette that she went home in a fever of excite¬ 
ment—and Benedick ground his teeth, and prayed 
that somehow his golden lady might know about it 
and feel a pang of the soft and bitter madness 
known as jealousy, which is the exclusive preroga¬ 
tive of women. He lay with his head in the pillow 
on the Renaissance bed most of the night, cursing 
his idiocy with profound fervour, wondering what 
insanity had made him think for a moment that 
he was interested in that yellow-haired girl, and 
resolving not to go near Raoul’s for at least a week. 
She was probably someone’s stenographer—or a 
lady authoress. Every now and then he slipped 
off into horrid little dreams; he was building a 
gallows out of pear trees for a gentleman called 
Tommy, and just when he had the noose ready, it 
slipped about his own throat—and he could feel it 
tightening, tightening, while someone laughed 
just behind him, very soft and clear—he woke 
with a shiver, and the dawn was in the room. He 
wouldn’t go to Raoul’s for a month. . . . 


THERE WAS A LADY 


55 


At five minutes to twelve he crossed the thresh¬ 
old, and she was there already with her hat off 
and a little fat green-and-gold book propped up 
against her goblet. Thank God that she had left 
that brown bounder at home! Benedick stared 
earnestly, and felt a deeper gratitude to Robert 
Herrick and his songs than he had ever known 
before. It was easy to see that she was safe in 
green meadows, brave with cowslips and violets 
and hawthorn and silver streams, playing with 
those charming maids, Corinna and Julia. Bene¬ 
dick breathed a sigh of relief, and when her lunch 
arrived he was stricken again with admiration at 
the perfection of her choice. Herrick himself 
could have done no better; the whole-wheat bread, 
the primrose pats of butter, the bowl in which the 
salad lurked discreetly—but he could see the emer¬ 
ald green of cress, and something small and silver 
and something round and ruddy—radishes and 
onions shining like jewels! There was a jar of am¬ 
ber honey, a little blue pitcher of thick cream, and 
a great blue bowl of crimson berries—strawberries 
in March, with a drift of fresh green mint leaves 
about them. Here was a lady who was either in¬ 
credibly wealthy or incredibly spendthrift! She 
closed her book when Jules put this other pastoral 
before her, and ate as though it might be a long, 
long time before she would eat anything again. 


56 


THERE WAS A LADY 


though she managed to look as though she were 
singing all the time. There was a bit of cream left 
for the kitten > and she fed it carefully, patted its 
white whiskers, and was gone. 

Benedick strolled out thoughtfully, remember¬ 
ing to smile at Genevieve, and feeling more 
like a good little boy than a ripened cynic. It 
was incredible how virtuous it made one feel 
to be happy! He wanted to adopt a yellow 
dog and give money to a beggar and buy out 
a florist shop. The florist shop was the only 
object accessible, and he walked in promptly; the 
clerk had spoken to him before he realized that he 
couldn’t send her flowers, because he didn’t happen 
to know who she was. He might tell him to send 
them to the Loveliest Lady in New York, but it 
was a little risky. However, he bought an armful 
of daffodils, and a great many rose-red tulips, 
and enough blue and white hyacinths to fill a 
garden, and went straight back to his apartment 
without even waiting for change from the gold 
piece that he gave to the clerk. He handed them 
over to the startled Harishidi with the curt order 
to put them in water; never mind if he didn’t have 
enough vases. Put them in high-ball glasses— 
finger-bowls—anywhere—he wanted them all over 
the place. The buyer of flowers then retired and 
put on a gorgeous and festively striped necktie. 



THERE WAS A LADY 


57 


washed his face and hands with a bland and pleas¬ 
ing soap, brushed his black hair until it shone, 
smiled gravely at the dark face in the mirror, and 
returned to the sitting room. There he selected a 
white hyacinth blossom with meticulous care, 
placed it in his buttonhole, and earnestly requested 
Harishidi to retire and remain in retirement until 
summoned. 

He spent quite a long time after that, draw¬ 
ing the curtains to shut out the grayness, 
struggling despairingly over the diminutive fire, 
piling the cushions so that they made a brilliant 
nest at one end of the velvet sofa, placing a gold- 
tooled volume of Aucassin and Nicolette where 
she could reach it easily—oh, if he could not send 
his flowers to her, he would bring her to his flowers! 
He adjusted the reading lamp with its painted 
parchment shade and dragged a stool up to the 
sofa. It was his sister-in-law’s best find—a broad 
and solid stool, sedate and comely—he sat there 
clasping his knees, his cheek against the velvet of 
the sofa—waiting. After a long time, he drew a 
deep breath, and smiled into the shadows. He did 
not turn his head; what need to turn it? 

She was there—he could see her sinking far back 
into the scarlet cushions, greeting his flowers with 
joyous eyes. She had on a cream-coloured dress of 
some soft stuff, and a long chain of amber beads; 



58 


THERE WAS A LADY 


the lamplight fell on her hair and on her clasped 
hands—and still he sat there, waiting. What need 
had they of speech? There was a perfume in her 
hair—a perfume of springtime, fleeting and ex¬ 
quisite; if he reached out his hand he could touch 
her. He sat very still; after a little while he felt 
her hand on his dark head, but still he did not stir 
—he only smiled more deeply into the shadows, 

and closed his eyes- His eyes were still closed 

when Harishidi came in to ask him if he had for¬ 
gotten dinner, and his lips were parted, like a little 
boy lost in a happy dream—in a happy, happy 
dream. . . . 

After that, the days passed by in an orderly and 
enchanted procession; he watched them bringing 
gifts to the corner table at Raoul’s, feeling warm 
and grateful and safe; too content to risk his joy 
by so much as stirring a finger. By and by he 
would speak to her, of course; in some easy, simple 
way he would step across the threshold of her life, 
and their hands would touch, never to fall apart 
again. She would drop her brief case, perhaps, and 
he would give it back to her, and she would smile; 
she would come into some drawing room where 
he was standing waiting patiently and the hostess 
would say, “You know Mr. Benedick, don’t you? 
He’s going to take you in to dinner.” He would 
go to more dinners—surely she must dine some- 



THERE WAS A LADY 


59 

I 

where, and dances—surely she danced! Or the 
gray kitten might capture that wisp of a hand¬ 
kerchief, and bring it to him as booty—he would 
rescue it and carry it back to her—and she would 

smile her thanks—she would smile- It would 

all be as simple as that—simpler, perhaps; for the 
time, he asked no more than to let the days slip 
by while he sat watching her across the table; 
that was enough. 

Ah, those days! There was the one when she 
brought out a great volume of Schopenhauer, 
and laughed all the time she read it; twice she 
laughed aloud, and so gay and clear was her deri¬ 
sion that Jules joined in, too. It was probably the 
essay on Woman, Benedick decided—the part 
where he said that ladies were little animals with 
long hair and limited intelligence. There was 
the day when she read out of a slim book of vellum 
about that small, enchanting mischief, Marjorie 
Fleming, and when Jules put the iced melon down 
before her she did not see it for almost a minute— 
her eyes were too full of tears. There was the 
day when she read “War and Peace” with her 
hands over her ears and such a look of terror on 
her face that Benedick had all that he could do to 
keep from crossing over and putting his arms about 
her, to close out all the dangers that she feared— 
even the ones she read about in books. 



60 


THERE WAS A LADY 


And suddenly March was over, and it was April, 
and there was the day when she took a new volume 
out of the brief case—so new that it still had its 
paper cover with large black letters announcing 
that it contained desirable information about 
Small Country Houses for Limited Incomes, Colo¬ 
nial Style. She read it with tremendous intensity 
and a look wavering between rapture and despair; 
once she sighed forlornly, and once she made a 
small, defiant face at some invisible adversary— 
and once she patted a picture lingeringly. 

After she had gone, Benedick took his sister-in- 
law’s automobile, and drove out to Connecticut, 
and bought a house—a little old white house with 
many-paned windows, that sat on a hill with lilac 
bushes around it, and looked at the silver waters of 
the Sound. It was perfectly preposterous that she 
shouldn’t have a house if she wanted it, and he 
was glad that she wanted a small country house, 
Colonial style, even though it didn’t necessarily 
imply a moderate income. For the first time in 
his life he was glad that his income was not moder¬ 
ate. When he got back to town he bought a gray 
roadster—not too heavy, so that she could drive it. 
She might want to be in and out of town a lot; you 
never could tell. 

He told his sister-in-law that he was going 
to raise Airedales, because it was impossible 



THERE WAS A LADY 


61 


to buy a decent puppy these days, and he 
discoursed lucidly and affably about a highly 
respectable Scotch couple that he was going to get 
to look after the white house and supervise the 
Airedales. After that he devoted most of his 
leisure hours to antique shops and auctions, where 
he purchased any amount of Sheraton furniture 
and Lowestoft china and Bristol glass and hooked 
rugs and old English chintzes for the benefit of the 
Airedale puppies and the Scotch couple. He 
hadn’t as much time as formerly, because he had 
been growing steadily more uncomfortable at the 
thought of explaining to those gray eyes and gay 
lips the undeniable fact that he had twenty-four 
hours of leisure to dispose of every day of his life; 
so he had wandered over to the dark office one 
morning and remarked casually to the gray gentle¬ 
man at the desk that he might blow in every now 
and then and see if there was anything around for 
him to do. It appeared that there was plenty 
around—so much that he took to blowing in at 
about nine and blowing out at about five—and he 
did it not so badly, though a good clerk might have 
done it better. He continued to spend a generous 
hour over lunch, however, proving a total loss to 
the firm for a considerable time after he returned, 
sometimes in such an abandoned mood that there 
was a flower in his buttonhole. * 


62 


THERE WAS A LADY 


\ 

And then it was May, and the sapphire feather 
was gone, and she would come in through the 
brown door with flowers on her drooping hat and 
pale frocks tinted like flowers, cool and crisp as 
dresses in a dream. She still had the brief case, 
but it was absurd to think that a stenographer 
would wear such hats; anything so ravishing would 
cost a year’s salary. When he wasn’t too busy 
watching the way her hair rippled back, showing 
just the tips of her ears, he would wonder whether 
she were a great heiress with an aversion to jewellery 
or a successful novelist who had to choose between 
pearls and Raoul’s. He had never seen even the 
smallest glint of jewels about her; never a gleam 
of beads at her throat or a brooch at her waist or a 
ring on her fingers—sometimes he thought that it 
would be pleasant to slip a long string of pearls 
about her neck and a band of frosted diamonds 
about her wrist, to see her eyes widen at their 
whiteness. Still, this way she was dearer, with 
flowers for her jewels—better leave the pearls 
alone—pearls were for tears. 

It was incredible how radiant she looked those 
days; when she came through the door with her fly¬ 
ing step and her flying smile the very kitten would 
purr at the sight of her; her eyes said that the secret 
that they knew was more delightful and amusing 
than ever, and her hands were always full of flowers. 



THERE WAS A LADY 


63 


And then there was the day that she came in 
looking so exultant that she frightened him; it 
wasn’t fair that she should look so happy when she 
didn’t know about the house on the hill, or the 
gray roadster, or the lucky person who was going 
to give them to her—it wasn’t fair and it was 
rather terrifying. Perhaps it would be better 
not to wait any longer to tell her about them; she 
couldn’t be disdainful and unkind through all that 
happiness. Of course he would lead up to it skil¬ 
fully. He wasn’t a blundering schoolboy; he was 
a man of the world, rather more than sophisti¬ 
cated, with all his wits about him and a light touch. 
He would catch her eye and smile, deferential and 
whimsical, and try some casual opening—“Our 
friend the kitten” or “good old Jules slower than 
usual—spring turns the best of us to idlers!” and 
the rest would follow as the night the day—or bet¬ 
ter still, as the day the night. It mightn’t be a 
bad idea to upset something—his wine glass, for 
instance; he raised a reckless hand, with a swift 
glance at the next table—and then he dropped it. 
She was reading a letter, an incredibly long letter, 
page after page of someone’s office paper covered 
with thick black words that marched triumphantly 
across the sheets, and her face was flooded with 
such eloquent light that he jerked back his head 
swiftly, as though he had been reading over her 



64 


THERE WAS A LADY 


shoulder. He could not speak to her with that 
light on her face; he sat watching her read it 
through twice, feeling cold and sick and lonely. 
He was afraid—he was afraid—he would speak 
to her to-morrow- 

To-morrow came, and with it his lady in a green 
muslin frock, and a shadowy hat wreathed with 
lilacs; he noted with a slow breath of relief that 
she had no brief case, no book, no letters. His 
coast was clear then at least; this day she had no 
better comrade to share her table—he would go to 
her, and ask her to understand. He had risen to 
his feet before he saw that she had not taken off 
her hat; she was sitting with her head a little bent, 
as though she was looking at something on the 
table, her face shadowed by the drooping hat, her 
hands clasped before her—and then Benedick saw 
what she was looking at. There was a ring on her 
finger, a small, trivial, inconsequential diamond, 
sparkling in its little golden claw like a frivolous 
dewdrop; and suddenly she bent her head, and 
kissed it. He sat down, slowly and stiffly—he felt 
old. He did not even see her go; it was Jules’ 
voice that made him lift his head. 

“Ah, le printemps, le printemps! V’ld la jolie 
demoiselle qui s’est fiancee.” 

“Yes,” said Benedick. “Spring—in spring it is 
agreeable to have a fiance.” 




THERE WAS A LADY 


65 


"‘Monsieur, perhaps, knows who she is?” 

“No,” replied Monsieur amiably. “But she is, 
as you say, a pretty girl.” 

“She is more than that, if Monsieur pardons. 
The man whose bride she will be has a little 
treasure straight from the good God. What a na¬ 
ture—what a nature! Generous as a queen with 
her silver, but she turns it to gold with her smile. 
Monsieur has perhaps noted her smile?” 

“No,” replied Monsieur, still amiably. “Bring 
me a bottle of the Widow Clicquot, however, and I 
will drink to her smile. Bring a large bottle so that 
I can drink often. It might be better to bring two.” 

He drank both of them under the eyes of the 
horrified Jules; it took him all of the afternoon and 
part of the evening to accomplish it, but he won 
out. All during the hours that he sat sipping the 
yellow stuff he was driving his mind in circles, 
round and round over the same unyielding ground, 
round and round again. It was a hideous mistake, 
of course; there was nothing irretrievable in an 
engagement. He could make her see how im¬ 
possible it was in just a few minutes; it might be a 
little hard on this other fellow at first, but that 
couldn’t be helped. He hadn’t been looking for 
her, starving for her, longing for her all the days of 
his life, this other fellow, had he? Probably he 
had told half-a-dozen girls he loved them—well. 



66 


THERE WAS A LADY 


let him find another to tell. But Benedick—whom 
else had Benedick loved? No one, no one, all the 
days of his life. 

Surely she would see that; surely when he 
told her about the white house and the gray 
roadster she would understand that he couldn’t 
let her go. He had been lonely too long— 
he had been hard and bitter and reckless too 
long—he would tell her how black and empty a 
thing was loneliness; when she saw how desperately 
he needed her, she would stay. When he told her 
about the two corner cupboards in the low-ceil- 
inged dining room, full of lilac lustre and sprigged 
Lowestoft, and the painted red chairs in the kit¬ 
chen, and the little stool for her feet with the 
fat white poodle embroidered in cross-stitch, she 
would see all the other things that he had never 
told her! There was the tarnished mirror with 
the painted clipper spreading all its sails—he had 
hung it so that it would catch her smile when she 
first crossed the threshold; there was the little 
room at the head of the stairs that the sun always 
shone into—he had built shelves there himself, and 
put in all his Jules Verne and R. L. S. and Oliver 
Optic and Robin Hood and the Three Musketeers 
and some unspeakably bad ones of Henty; he had 
been waiting for her to tell him what kind of books 
little girls read, and then he was going to put them 


THERE WAS A LADY 


67 


in, too. Of course she couldn’t understand those 
things unless he told her—to-morrow when she 
came he would tell her everything and she would 
understand, and be sorry that she had hurt him; 
she would never go away again. 

At eleven o’clock Jules once more despairingly 
suggested that Monsieur must be indeed fatigued, 
and that it would perhaps be better if Monsieur 
retired. Monsieur, however, explained with great 
determination and considerable difficulty that he 
had an extremely important engagement to keep, 
and that all things considered, he would wait there 
until he kept it. True, it was not until to-morrow, 
but he was not going to take any chances; he would 
wait where he was. Raoul was called in, and 
expostulated fervently, “Mais enfin , Monsieur! 
Ce n'est pas convenable, Monsieur /” 

Monsieur smiled at him, vague and obstinate, 
and Raoul finally departed with a Gallic shrug, 
leaving poor Jules in charge, who sat nodding re¬ 
proachfully in a far corner, with an occasional 
harrowed glance at the other occupant of the room. 
The other occupant sat very stiff and straight far 
into the night; it was toward morning that he 
made a curious sound, between defeat and despair, 
and dropped his dark head on his arms, and slept. 
Once he stirred, and cried desperately: “Don’t 
go—don’t go, don’t go!” 


08 THERE WAS A LADY 

Jules was at his side in a moment, forgiving and 
solicitous. 

‘ ‘ Monsieur desire ? 9 9 

And Monsieur started up and stared at him 
strangely—only to shake his head, and once more 
bury it deep in his arms. It was not Jules who 
could get what Monsieur desired. . . . 

It was late the next morning when he waked 
and he consumed a huge amount of black coffee, 
and sat back in his corner, haggard and unshaven, 
with a withered flower in his buttonhole, waiting 
for her to come through the door—but she did not 
come. Not that day, nor the next, nor the next; 
he sat in his corner from twelve to two, waiting, 
with a carefully mocking smile on his lips and a 
curious expression in his eyes, wary and incredu¬ 
lous. He had worked himself into an extremely 
reasonable state of mind; a state of mind in which 
he was acidly amused at himself and tepidly in¬ 
terested in watching the curtain fall on the comedy 
—he blamed a good deal on the spring and a taste 
for ridiculously unbalanced literature; the whole 
performance w r as at once diverting and distasteful. 
This kind of mania came from turning his back on 
pleasant flirtations and normal affaires de cceur; 
it was a neatly ironical punishment that the God 
of Comedy was meting out to pay him for his 
overweening sense of superiority. Well, it was 



THERE WAS A LADY 


69 


merited—and it was over! But he still sat in the 
corner, watching, and the fourth day the door 
opened, and she came in. 

She had on a gray dress, with a trail of yellow 
roses across her hat and a knot of them at her waist, 
and a breeze came in with her. She stood hesitating 
for a moment in the sunlight, and then she went 
quickly to where Genevieve sat at her high desk, 
and stretched out her hands, with a pretty gesture, 
shy and proud. The sunlight fell across them, 
catching at a circle above the diamond ring—a 
little golden circle, very new and bright. Bene¬ 
dick rose to his feet, pushing back his chair—he 
brushed by her so close that he could smell the 
roses; he closed the brown door behind him gently 
and leaned against it, staring down the shining 
street, where the green leaves danced, joyous and 
sedate, upon the stunted trees. Well, the curtain 
had fallen on the comedy; that was over. After 
a minute, he shrugged his shoulders, and strolled 
leisurely down to the real-estate agent and sold 
him the little white house, lock, stock, and barrel, 
including some rather good china and a lot of old 
junk that he had picked up here and there. It 
was fortunate that the young couple from Gram- 
ercy Square wanted it; he was willing to let it go 
for a song. Yes, there was a view of the Sound, 
and he’d done quite a lot of planting; oh, yes. 


70 


THERE WAS A LADY 


there was a room that could be used as a nursery— 
lots of sun. There was his signature, and there 
was the end of it—the papers could be sent to his 
lawyers. He then sauntered over to his sister-in- 
law’s and presented her with the gray roadster; 
he was about fed up with motoring, and he’d 
changed his mind about Airedales. Dogs were a 
nuisance. After a little pleasant banter he dropped 
in at the club and played three extremely brilliant 
rubbers of auction, and signed up for a stag theatre 
party to see a rather nasty little French farce. 
He didn’t touch any of the numerous cocktails— 
he wasn’t going to pay her the compliment of get¬ 
ting drunk again—but he laughed harder than 
any one at the farce, and made a good many com¬ 
ments that were more amusing than the play, and 
his best friend and his worst enemy agreed that 
they had never seen him in such high spirits. 

He went back to the apartment humming to him¬ 
self, and yawned ostentatiously for Harishidi’s ben¬ 
efit, and left word not to wake him in the morning— 
and yawned again, and went to bed. He lay there 
in the blackness for what seemed hours, listening to 
his heart beat; there was a tune that kept going 
round in his head, some idiotic thing by an Eliza¬ 
bethan— Fair and kind”—he must go lighter on 
the coffee. “Was never face so pleased my 
mind-” Coffee played the deuce with your 



THERE WAS A LADY 


71 


nerves. “Passing by-” Oh, to hell with it! 

He stumbled painfully out of bed, groping his way 
to the living room, jerking on the light with a 
violence that nearly broke the cord. One o’clock; 
the damned clock must have stopped. No, it 
was still ticking away, relentless and competent. 
He stood staring about him irresolutely for a 
moment, and then moved slowly to the Florentine 
chest, fumbling at the drawer. Yes, there it was— 
“An Elizabethan Song, Sung by Mr. Roger 
Grahame”—“There was a lady, fair and kind”— 

There was a lady-He flung up the window with 

a gesture of passionate haste, and leaning far out, 
hurled the little black disk into deeper blackness. 
Far off he heard a tinkling splinter from the 
area; he closed the window, and pulled the cord 
on the wrought-iron lamp, and stumbled back to 
the Renaissance bed. 

He was shaking uncontrollably, like someone 
in a chill, and he had a sickening desire to 
weep—to lay his hot cheek against some kind 
hand, and weep away the hardness and the 
bitterness and despair. Loathsome, brain-sick 
fool! He clenched his hands and glared de¬ 
fiance to the darkness, he who had not wept 
since a voice had ceased to read him fairy tales 
a long time ago. After eternities of staring the 
hands relaxed, and he turned his head, and slept. 




72 


THERE WAS A LADY 


He woke with a start—there was something salt 
and bitter on his lips; he brushed it away fiercely, 
and the clock in the living room struck four. After 
that he did not sleep again; he set his teeth and 
stared wide-eyed into the shadows—he would not 
twice be trapped to shame. He was still lying 
there when the sun drifted through the window; 
he turned his face to the wall, so that he would not 
see it, but he did not unclench his teeth. . . . 

It was June, and he took a passage for Norway, 
and tore it up the day that the boat sailed. There 
was a chance in a thousand that she might need 
him, and it would be like that grim cat Fate to drop 
him off in Norway when he might serve her. For 
two or three days she had been looking pale; the 
triumphant happiness that for so long she had 
flaunted in his face, joyous and unheeding, was 
wavering like the rose-red in her lips. It was 
probably nothing but the heat; why couldn’t that 
fool she had married see that she couldn’t stand 
heat? She should be sitting somewhere against 
green pines, with the sea in her eyes and a breeze 
lifting the bright hair from her forehead. 

She never read any more. She sat idle with her 
hands linked before her;it must be something worse 
than heat that was painting those shadows under 
her eyes, that look of heart-breaking patience 
about her lips. And Benedick, who had flinched 


THERE WAS A LADY 


73 


from her happiness, suddenly desired it more 
passionately than he had ever desired anything 
else in his life. Let the cur who had touched that 
gay courage to this piteous submission give it back 
—let him give it back—he would ask nothing more. 
How could a man live black enough to make her 
suffer? She hardly touched the food that was 
placed before her; Jules hovered about her in dis¬ 
tress, and she tried to smile at him—and Benedick 
turned his eyes from that smile. She would sit 
very quiet, staring at her linked hands with their 
two circles, as though she were afraid to breathe— 
she, to whom the air had seemed flowers and wine 
and music. Once he saw her lips shake, terribly, 
though a moment later she lifted her head with 
the old, valiant gesture, and went out smiling. 

Then for a day she did not come—for another 
day—for another—and when once more she stood 
in the door. Benedick felt his heart give a great 
leap, and stand still. She was in black, black from 
head to foot, with a strange little veil that hid her 
eyes. She crossed the room to her table, and sat 
down quietly, and ordered food, and ate, and drank 
a little wine. After Jules had taken the things 
away she still sat there, pressing her hands to¬ 
gether, her lips quite steady—only when she un¬ 
linked them, he saw the faint red crescents where 
the nails had cut. 



74 


THERE WAS A LADY 


So that was why she had had shadows painted 
jbeneath her eyes; he had been ill, the man who had 
given her the rings; he had died. It would be 
cruel to break the hushed silence that hung about 
her with his clumsy pity, but soon he would go to 
her and say, “Do not be sad. Sadness is an ugly 
thing, believe me. I cannot give you what he 
gave you, perhaps, but here is the heart from my 
body. It is cold and hard and empty; take it in 
your hands, and warm it. My need of you is 
greater than your need of him—you can not leave 
me.” He would say that to her, after a little 
while. 

The gray kitten touched her black skirt with 
its paw, and she caught it up swiftly, and laid 
her cheek against its fur. It was no longer the 
round puff that she had first smiled on, but it was 
still soft—it still purred. She put it down very 
gently, and rose, looking about her as on that first 
day; at the place where the fire had burned in the 
corner, at the pansies, jaded and drooping in their 
green pots; once again her eyes swept by Benedick 
as though he were not there. They lingered on 
Genevieve for a moment, and when they met Jules’ 
anxious, faithful gaze she parted her lips as though 
to speak, and gave it up with a little shake of her 
head, and smiled instead—a piteous and a lovely 
smile—and she was gone. . . . 



THERE WAS A LADY 


75 


He never saw her again. That was not a hun¬ 
dred years ago—no, and it was not yesterday; the 
steel has come into his hair and his eyes since then, 
but sometimes he still goes to Raoul’s to lunch, 
and sits at the corner table, where he can see the 
brown door. Who can tell when it might open 
and let in the spring—who can tell what day might 
find her standing there once more, with her gay 
eyes and her tilted lips and the sunlight dancing 
in her hair? 

Benedick’s best friend and his worst enemy and 
the world and his pretty sister-in-law are very wise, 

no doubt, but once—once there was a lady- 

He never touched the tip of her fingers, but she 
was the only lady that Benedick ever loved. 




LONG DISTANCE 


D EVON snapped the stub of his cigarette in¬ 
to the fire with a movement of amused 
impatience, his fingers more eloquent than 
his thin, impassive countenance. 

‘‘Nothing, was it?” 

“No, nothing—that unspeakable wind.” Anne 
Carver gave a last reluctant glance over her 
shoulder into the shadowed hall, and pulled the 
door to behind her, turning her face to the warm, 
bright room with a rueful smile. “I’m sorry, 
Hal; it’s outrageous of me—right in the middle of 
that thrilling story, too.” 

In spite of her slim height and the sophisticated 
skill with which she had wound her velvety black 
hair about her small head—in spite of the length 
of filmy train that swept behind her, she looked 
like some charming and contrite child as she came 
slowly across the room to the deep chintz chair 
and the dancing warmth of the fire. 

“But it’s nonsense, my dear girl; sheer, unmiti¬ 
gated nonsense! Here you are spoiling what might 
have been a delightful evening by working your- 

76 


LONG DISTANCE 


77 


self up into a magnificent state of nerves, and over 
what, I ask you? Over nothing, over less than 
nothing! Poor old Derry telephones that he 
won’t be able to get out to-night because he’s been 
dragged in on some fool party, and you apparently 
interpret it into meaning that you’re never going 
to lay eyes on him again in this world. You’ve 
been restless as a witch all evening—every time a 
door’s slammed or a latch has rattled you’ve fairly 
leapt out of your skin; and permit me to inform 
you that you’re getting me so that I’m about to 
start leaping, too. Nice, cheerful atmosphere for 
the stranger within your gates, my child.” 

“I’m awfully sorry, Hal. I’ll be good, truly. 
It’s only that-” 

“Only what, for the love of Heaven? You 
aren’t expecting him back to-night, are you?” 

“Well, of course, I know that he said he couldn’t 
possibly manage it, but he might—he can manage 
anything. And he wanted so dreadfully to see 
you; it’s been years, hasn’t it?” 

“Three,” replied Devon concisely. 

i 

“Well, you see! And of course he’d want to see 
me dreadfully, because it’s been years since he’s 
seen me, too; we have breakfast at half-past seven. 
Isn’t that hideous? It takes him an hour to get 
into town; I do hate that. A whole hour away— 
think of it-” 





78 


LONG DISTANCE 


“Anne, I blush for you; I do indeed. It’s em¬ 
barrassing for any well-behaved bachelor to hear 
you talk. It’s sinful to lavish that amount of de¬ 
votion on any man that lives.” 

“Not on Derry.” The clear face was a little 
flushed, but the shining eyes met his unwaveringly. 
“You lavish it, too, Hal! I used to be bored to 
distraction by the tales that you’d pour out for 
hours on end about the fabulous student who was 
on his way back from Paris to spread havoc 
amongst the maidens of America. I used to laugh 
at you—remember?” 

“Of course I remember.” The dark, ironic face 
was suddenly touched with a very charming smile. 
“That first evening that I brought him over after 
supper, and he talked until a quarter to one until 
he had everyone as excited as he was about things 
that we actually wouldn’t give a snap of our fingers 
for; I can see him standing by the mantel now, with 
every golden hair on his head ruffled up, and those 
crazy sherry-coloured eyes of his half mad with 
excitement, ranting like a Frenchman and laughing 
like a lunatic—I can see you with your face tilted 
up to him, forgetting that any of the rest of us 
were alive-You had on a gray dress and some¬ 

one had sent you white flowers, and you were 
wearing a long string of green beads that hung to 
your knees-” 




r LONG DISTANCE 


79 


“ Hal, you’re making that up! Four years-’’ 

“Is four years too long to remember green beads 
and white flowers? Perhaps you’re right! But 
it isn’t too long to remember Derry’s voice when he 
told us about the night that he and the drunken 
cab driver spent in the Louvre, is it? Shades of 
Gargantua, how that kid could laugh! After all, 
there’s never been any one else just like him, has 
there?” 

“Not ever—oh, not ever. It’s the cruellest 
shame that he couldn’t be here now; he’d love it so, 
and you could have such a beautiful time reminis¬ 
cing—oh, I can’t bear having him away on a night 
like this. When I went to the door just then those 
trees by the gate were straining like dogs on a leash, 
and the wind had wrenched a great branch off the 
lilac bush. I do hate November! And the rain like 
gray floods—and so cold , Hal. He oughtn’t to be 
out in that, truly. He ought to be here where he 
could play with us, where it’s warm and kind and— 
safe. Do you suppose they were motoring?” 

“I don’t suppose anything at all. My dear girl, 
you aren’t going to start that all over again?” 

“Ah, it’s frightfully silly, I know. Old mar¬ 
ried people—three-year-old married people—they 
oughtn’t to mind things like that. But it’s the 
first time that he’s been away all night, and I’m— 
oh, I’m ridiculous. Scold me, scold me hard!” 





80 


LONG DISTANCE 


“You’re a very difficult person to scold, all 
things considered. It’s those unprincipled eye¬ 
lashes, probably. First time in three years, 
honestly, Anne? Good Lord, it’s unbelievable!” 

“ Hal!" 

“Well, but my good child! Long Island and the* 
twentieth century and the tottering state of holy 
matrimony—it’s simply defying the laws of 
gravity! Do you sit here hanging the crane every 
night of your lives?” 

“Oh, Hal, you lovely idiot! Of course we 
don’t; we go out any amount and have people here 
a lot, and go in town, too. Only we happen to 
like each other—rather—and to like to play to¬ 
gether—rather—so we just go ahead and do it. 
It’s simply happened that up to now nothing 
turned up that we couldn’t do together; of course 
it was bound to happen sooner or later. Of course 
I know that, Hal.” She leaned forward, the fire¬ 
light painting flying shadows on the vivid, high¬ 
bred little face. “But I’m an utter goose about 
Derry. I feel empty when he isn’t around, and I 
don’t care who knows it.” 

“A bit hard on the rest of us, isn't it? Still, if 
it’s the same Derry that I practically bestowed on 
you at the altar I’m rather inclined to get your 
point of view. Not changed for the worse?” 

“Changed for the better, thank you!” laughed 


LONG DISTANCE 


81 


Derry’s wife. “Better and better and better 
every minute, once removed from your sinister 
influence.” She smiled her gay affection at him, 
and then suddenly the smile wavered, faded—she 
sprang to her feet, trailing her blue-green draperies 
over to the long window. 

“Don’t you hate that noise, Hal? No, listen. 
The rain’s out to drown the world, and that 

wind-” She shivered, staring out into the 

menacing blackness, raging like a wild beast on the 
other side of the lighted window. “Poor Hal, it’s 
going to be simply awful for you! It’s a good ten 
minutes’ walk to the club, and these back roads 
turn into mud soup if it even showers! I do think 
it’s a wicked shame.” 

“Perhaps I’d better be getting on my way-” 

“No, no!” There was a note of sheer panic in 
her voice, though she laughed it down valiantly. 
“Why, it can’t be eleven, and he isn’t going to call 
up till twelve. You simply have to entertain me; 
I w T on’t be abandoned yet. No, I mean it. Let’s 
start again—about Brazil. You were telling me 
about Brazil- 

“You aren’t even remotely interested in Brazil,” 
he accused. “But I’ll talk to you about any 
place from Peoria to Patagonia, if you’ll stop wan¬ 
dering about like a lost soul, and come back to the 
fire, like a good child.” 





82 


LONG DISTANCE 


“Yes,” replied the good child obediently, drop¬ 
ping the curtain. “Does—does it seem cold to you 
in here, Hal?” 

“Cold? It’s heavenly warm; if I were a cat I’d 
purr for you.” 

“It feels—cold, to me,” said Anne Carver, 
spreading her hands before the leaping flames. 
“As though the wind had got in through the win¬ 
dow somehow, and into my blood—and into my 
bones-” 

“Nonsense,” said Devon sharply. “You got 
chilled standing over there; you’re an unconscion¬ 
able goose, and I’m beginning to be strongly out of 
patience with you. Sit down and put your feet 
on the fender—want something over your shoul¬ 
ders?” 

She shook her head, holding her hands closer to 
the fire. 

“No, please—I’d rather not sit down just yet. 
It was the window, of course. Don’t be cross; I 
do want to hear the rest of that about Brazil. 
Some day I’m going there; some day I’m going to 
find a country where there’s no such time as 
autumn—no such month as November, full of dead 
leaves, and wind and cold—and emptiness. Tell 
me what’s prettiest there; there must be so many 
pretty things? Birds with shining feathers— 
butterflies like flowers—flowers like butterflies— 




LONG DISTANCE 83 

gold like sunshine and sunshine like gold—oh. I’m 
warmer just for thinking of it! Tell me what was 
prettiest?” 

“I saw nothing half so pretty as a lady with 
the lamplight falling about her, bending over 
pansies black as her hair in a bowl green as her 
eyes.” 

“Oh!” She straightened swiftly, giving the 
flowers a last friendly touch, and facing him, 
lightly flushed, lightly reproachful. “Green, Hal? 
That’s not pretty at all—and it stands for some¬ 
thing shameful.” 

Devon raised quizzical eyebrows. 

“Never felt the honest pangs of jealousy, Anne?” 

“But how could I, even if I were capable of such 
cheapness and ugliness? I’ve never in my life 
cared for any one but Derry.” 

“And Derry, lovely lady, would never give you 
cause?” 

“Derry?” The startled incredulity of that cry 
rang into clear mirth. “Why, Hal, it may be 
difficult for you to believe, but Derry loves me.” 

Devon tapped the ashes off his cigarette, and sat 
staring for a moment at the reddened tip. 

“It doesn’t precisely strain my credulity to the 
breaking point,” he replied drily. “No, I can 
imagine that Derry might love you. It hardly re¬ 
quires any colossal stretch of imagination on my 


84 LONG DISTANCE 

part, either. I’ve loved you myself for thirteen 
years.” 

“Hal!” 

“Loved you with every drop of blood in my 
body. There’s no use looking stricken and melo¬ 
dramatic, Anne. I’ve never worried you much 
about it, have I?” 

“No,” she whispered voicelessly. 

“No. Well, then, don’t worry me about it now, 
there’s a good girl. I’m off for Ceylon to-morrow, 
and I haven’t the most remote intention of making 
a nuisance of myself to-night. You don’t have 
to remind me of the fact that Derry’s my best 
friend, that I was his best man, that you are his 
wife. I have an excellent memory for such trifling 
details myself. It’s only fair to add, however, 
that I wouldn’t give a tuppenny damn for the 
whole collection if it weren’t for one other.” 

“Which other?” she asked, her eyes meeting 
his steadily, infinitely gentle and remote. 

“The rather important one that you’re happy,” 
replied Devon evenly. “I came all the way back 
from Brazil to find out whether he was making 
you happy—and now I’m off to-morrow.” 

“Happy is a poor word for what he has made 
me,” she said. “You should have known that, 
you who know Derry. Oh, Hal—oh, Hal, how 
could you?” 




LONG DISTANCE 


85 


“It isn’t done, I know,” he assented. “It’s 
always the cad and the villain who is caught out 
making love to his friend’s wife at all hours of the 
night. But there’s a slight distinction in my 
favour, you see; I am loving you, not making love 
to you.” 

“You’re hurting me,” she told him. “Pretty 
badly.” 

“You have no right to be hurt. It’s nothing 
ugly that I am giving you. Out of pain and bit¬ 
terness and despair I’ve wrought something rather 
fine; it isn’t like you to disdain it, my dear. Ever 
since you were a little girl with dark braids swing¬ 
ing to your waist, I’ve brought you presents; every 
corner of the earth I’ve ransacked just to have 
you touch those gifts with your fingers, and say, 
‘That’s lovely, Hal—that’s lovely’—and smile. 
The only thing worth giving you was not in my 
power to bestow, but I wanted to make sure that 
you had it, no matter whose hands had held it out 
to you Happiness is yours, Anne—I have nothing 
left to give you but my love. I swear to you that 
there is not one thing in it that gives you the right 
to say that it hurts you. Believe me, you can take 
it in your hands—and smile.” 

“Yes. Yes, Hal.” She smiled at him, grave 
and misty-eyed—and he smiled back. 

“Then that’s about all, my dear, and I’ll be 




86 


LONG DISTANCE 


going. It’s no hour at all for a poor bachelor to 
be awake. Good-night, Anne; sweet dreams to 
you.” 

“Hal, I don’t want you to go—please, I don’t 
want you to go.” There was something so des¬ 
perate in her low entreaty that he halted with lifted 
brows. “I know that it’s utterly foolish and un¬ 
reasonable—and—and selfish, but I simply can’t 
bear to be left here alone until Derry calls me up. 
Please, please don’t leave me.” . 

“Very well.” He turned back to his chair 
slowly. “This isn’t like you, you know.” 

“I know.” She sat staring down at her locked 
fingers. “It isn’t a bit like me; I haven’t any 
nerves at all, as a rule—not enough to make me 
sympathetic even. Derry says my lack of imagi¬ 
nation is simply appalling—that unless I can see a 
thing or touch it or taste it or smell it or hear it, I 
simply won’t believe that it exists—that I don’t 
really believe that the world’s round, because it 
looks flat to me! He laughs about it, but I do 
honestly think that it worries him.” 

“It generally worries Derry when someone 
doesn’t see things his way.” Devon smiled remi¬ 
niscently. 

“Well, you know how he is. He fully believes 
that they’re trying to signal to us from Mars, and 
he almost goes wild because no one pays any at- 




LONG DISTANCE 


87 


tention to the signals! He thinks that phono¬ 
graphs are much more incredible than Ouija 
boards, and that telephones are far more extraor¬ 
dinary than telepathy. It wouldn’t be any effort 
to Derry to believe that the world was shaped 
like a hat-box, with blue and green stripes and a 
nice little handle to carry it around!” 

“You must be a great trial to him, Madame 
Materialist.” 

“Oh, he wrings his hands over me. He says for 
any one to seem as spiritual and be as literal as I 
am is nothing more nor less than a swindle. Oh, 
oh, if he could see me to-night!” 

i 

“But will you be good enough to tell me what in 
the name of Heaven is the matter with you to¬ 
night?” 

“I don’t know; I don’t know.” She drew a long 
breath, making a piteous effort to smile. “I’m— 
frightened.” 

“Frightened of what?” 

“I don’t know, I tell you.” She glanced about 
her with a long, despairing shiver. “Of the night 
—of the world—of the room—of—of everything.”, 

“The room! You know when you talk like 
that, Anne, you make me seriously consider ring¬ 
ing up a doctor. I don’t believe that all America 
holds a more delightful room—gayer or kinder or 
more friendly; it’s nothing short of a miracle what 


88 


LONG DISTANCE 


you’ve done to this old barn! It’s the most reas¬ 
suring room I’ve ever set my foot in; you know, 
when you come into it with its fires and flowers and 
lights, you can almost hear it singing and laughing 
to itself, ‘Here—here dwells happiness.’” 

“Oh, yes, you’re right—it has been happy.” 
Her eyes strayed over its treasures; the shelves 
warm and bright with books, with the beloved 
Lowestoft standing like flowers against the panelled 
cream of the walls, the lustre gleaming in blue and 
copper bravery along the firelit mantel, the glazed 
chintz holding out its prim nosegays proudly for 
all to see—the English prints on the walls echoing 
the gay warmth of the hooked rugs on the floor— 
she brought her haunted eyes back to Devon. 

“It’s a pretty roo.m,” she said in a strange little 
voice. “I do think it’s quite a pretty room. But 
do you know what it looks like to me to-night? 
To-night it looks to me like a corpse that someone 
had dressed in a flowered frock and a ribboned 
hat.” 

“Anne!” His voice cracked out like a whip. 
“Now that’s enough; you’re to pull yourself to¬ 
gether at once, or I’m going to call up the doctor. 
That’s an abominably morbid thing to say—it’s 
simply not healthy. I’m not joking, my dear; I 
have every intention of calling him up if you 
haven’t yourself in hand in the next five minutes.” 





LONG DISTANCE 


89 


He leaned across to the table, drawing the 
shining black instrument closer toward him. 

“D’you think I’m sick?” she asked piteously. 
‘'You know, I do think I must be sick. I’m so— 
I’m so dreadfully cold.” 

“Here-” He rose abruptly. “Where’s 

your scarf?” 

“No—no—it isn’t a scarf I want. I’m cold in¬ 
side, dreadfully, dreadfully. It isn’t a scarf.” 

“You’re worrying me badly, Anne. Look here, 
what is it? This party of Derry’s, honestly?” 

“Yes, the party. It’s foolish, I know; I know— 
don’t say it, please—I know.” 

“Well, but what about it? Did Derry seem 
worried himself? Did he sound upset?” 

“No. He sounded—casual. As casual as—as 
casual as-” She made a little despairing ges¬ 

ture with her hand. “I can’t tell you how casual 
he sounded.” 

“Well, then-” 

“Well, then, but that’s it, Hal. Derry isn’t a 
bit a casual person, and here were you for the first 
time in three years—and here was I, and he knows 
how I loathe being left alone out here with the 

maids—and he sounded as though it were—- 

• ' 

nothing. Just nothing at all.” 

“And is this honestly the mole-hill out of which 
you’ve built your mountain?” 








90 


LONG DISTANCE 


‘‘No—I don’t know; I can’t even explain it to 
myself—how could I explain it to you? It wasn’t 
anything tangible at first. Just a feeling of—of 
discomfort—something vague and not pleasant; I 
couldn’t even put my finger on it. I told myself 
that I was being silly and unreasonable—I did 
indeed. You mustn’t think that I enjoy this kind 
of thing. I hate it, I hate it.” 

“But I’m so utterly at sea to account for this, 
my dear, and I want to help you. You’re tor¬ 
menting yourself about something real if we could 
only put our finger on it. Something that Derry 
said or did that worried you; you can’t make 
me believe that you’ve manufactured all of 
this out of thin air! It’s too unlike you—why, 
ever since that first day I met you, a pale mite 
of a thing with great eyes and long braids, brave 
and proud and gentle in the midst of the rest 
of those young hoydens, I’ve found you exquisitely 
fair and adorably, adorably reasonable. No 
one’s ever been like you, Anne; you mustn’t 
wreck my world by showing me little clay feet 
to-night.” 

“Trying to flatter me into being a good child? 
That’s dear of you, but oh, I’m beyond flattery. 
I’m making up for any past arrears of reason to¬ 
night, I promise you.” 

“Well, then, let’s try to get to the bottom of it— 


LONG DISTANCE 


91 


hunt the good old subconscious into the open! 
Now what exactly was this famous telephone con¬ 
versation, word for word?” 

She turned her head restlessly. 

“Oh, Hal, what does it matter? Very well— 
only I’ve told you once, you know. He said, 
‘I’m awfully sorry, dear, but I won’t be able to get 
out this evening. Tell Hal that I’m sorry as the 
dickens, but that we can have lunch at the office 
to-morrow; one sharp. That’ll give him plenty of 
time to get off again on his globe-trotting. ’ And 
I said, ‘But what time will you get out? ’ He said, 
‘Six-thirty to-morrow, as usual. I may bring Joe 
Carey along with me.’ I was so surprised that I 
almost lost my voice, Hal, and I said, ‘Why, Derry, 
not to-night ?’ And he just laughed, and said, ‘No; 
I’ve been roped in on the darnedest party you ever 
heard of—got to run now, or I’d explain. I can’t 
possibly get out of it. You’ll be awfully amused 
when I tell you. It’s a good joke on me! ’ I said, 
‘But where are you going?’ And Derry said, 
‘Lord knows! I’ve got to run, honestly, dear. 
Tell you what I’ll do: I’ll call you up when it’s over, 
and let you in on the whole blooming thing. It’s 
too good to sleep on; wait till you hear! It may be 
late—will you be awake at twelve?’ And I said, 
‘I’ll be awake at six if you don’t call up. Promise, 
Derry. ’ And he said, ‘ Promised! Not later than 


92 LONG DISTANCE 

twelve. Give Hal my best—see you both to¬ 
morrow/ And—he rang off.” 

“That was absolutely all there was to it?” 

“Absolutely all.” 

“Very well. I’ll bet you five thousand dollars 
to a pansy, Lady Tragedy, that the midnight ex¬ 
pedition runs somewhat on these lines. Mr. 
Jabez K. Rugg from Omaha, Nebraska, blows into 
our Derry’s office late this afternoon with an in¬ 
teresting proposition. He has heard that he is the 
most promising young architect in America, and as 
he is desirous of presenting his third wife with 
a cross between a Moorish palace and a French 
chateau for a little anniversary surprise he has ap¬ 
plied to Derry for some sound advice, for which he 
is willing and eager to disburse colossal sums. 
Time presses, however, and the worthy Mr. Rugg 
yearns to invest his precious hours in New York 
both profitably and pleasantly. He suggests that 
the promising young architect put on his hat, lock 
up his office, and sally forth into the night, which 
they will spend together, chattering of business and 
painting the unfortunate town a brilliant red. He 
doesn’t happen to know the ropes, but he has a 
really touching confidence in our Derrick. And 
our Derrick, fired with the desire to hang pearls 
about your neck and sables about your shoulders, 
wafts a good-night kiss to the pleasant anticipa- 


LONG DISTANCE 


93 


tion of firelight and candlelight, and sallies forth 
into what the poet refers to as ‘the lights of old 
Broadway.’ And there you are! Please pick me 
out a nice pansy.” 

“That’s all very clever and amusing, Hal, but 
it isn’t especially convincing. And it doesn’t 
relieve me any more than if someone tried to cheer 
things up by doing a fox-trot to the funeral march. 
You needn’t scowl; it doesn’t. If it was as simple 
as that, why didn’t he explain it at the time?” 

“My dear child, he was evidently in a tearing 
hurry—he’d have had to go into elaborate ex¬ 
planations to make it clear, and he obviously 
wasn’t in any position to indulge in the luxury of 
explanations. The impetuous Mr. Rugg may have 
been clamouring at the door, or tooting his horn 
underneath the window. At any rate, he’s going 
to call you up in a bare half hour, and clear up the 
whole thing; he’s apt to keep his word, isn’t he?" 

“Apt to?” she echoed scornfully. “He’d keep 
his word if the world came to an end. I thought 
that you knew him.” 

At the disdain in her voice something violently 
resentful flared in the dark eyes that met hers. 

“Why, so did I,” he returned evenly. “But 
apparently I was mistaken. The Derry I knew 
was not a plaster saint, you see!” 

“Nor is the Derry that I know—plaster.” Her 


94 


LONG DISTANCE 


voice shook, but she held her head very high. 
“Are you trying to make me mistrust him, Hal? 
Be careful, please; you are only making me mis¬ 
trust you.” 

“Oh, good God!” He flung at her a look of 
such revolt and despair that the small frozen face 
softened. “Look here, don’t—don’t let’s make 
more of a mess of this. You can’t believe that 
kind of thing of me, Anne; you may know Derry, 
but you’ve known me longer, after all. I’d cut 
my throat before I’d try to come between you two. 

Derry’s worth a thousand of me, of course—I 

» 

know. He’s made you happy, and nothing that I 
could do in this life or the next would ever repay 
him for that. But just for a moment it galled me 
hideously to have you lavishing that flood of ado¬ 
ration on any man that lived: it was a flick on a 
raw wound, and something deep in me yelled out 
rebellion. You think jealousy a cheap and ugly 
thing, you say—well, now you know just how 
cheap, just how ugly it can be!” 

“Ah, I’m sorry-” She leaned to him, all 

gentleness once more. “I’m sorry that I was hate¬ 
ful; it’s nothing but these unspeakable nerves, 
truly. Let’s forget it all, shan’t we? Do you 
think it’s letting up a little outside? It doesn’t 
sound quite so—so savage, does it?” As though 
resentful of her waning terror, the beast outside 




LONG DISTANCE 


95 


flung itself at them once more, pouncing on the 
house with a long and terrible roar, shaking it in 
its monstrous claws as though it would rattle the 
flimsy barriers of wood and glass out of their 
cracking frames. She shrank deeper into the 
chair with a tremulous laugh. “Oh, no, it’s in¬ 
credible—no, listen to it. I’ll wager that it’s 

literally tearing trees up by the roots and-” 

She broke off tensely. “Hal, you don’t think 
that it could damage the wires, do you?” 

“No, no; nonsense! It sounds a great deal 
worse than it is; this house is nothing but a rattle¬ 
trap, I tell you. It takes a worse storm than this 
to put a telephone out of commission.” 

“If he doesn’t telephone, I can’t bear it,” she 
said softly. “ That’s not rhetoric. I simply can’t 
bear it.” 

“Well, we can settle that,” said Devon briefly. 
“I’ll get Central and-” 

The telephone that he reached for suddenly gave 
a faint jangle—a small, far-off warning of sound— 
and then it rang aloud, sharp and imperative. 

“Oh, Hal /” Her voice was an exultant quiver. 
“No, no, give it to me; he’s early, isn’t he? It’s 
not nearly twelve, is it? Yes—yes, this is Mrs. 

Carver—this is Anne, darling-” The thrilled 

voice wavered and flagged. “Oh—oh, I’m sorry; 
you must have the wrong number. . . . Yes, 







96 


LONG DISTANCE 


it’s Mrs. Carver—Mrs. Derrick Carver. No, but 
it’s a mistake. . . . No, no one’s been using 

the wire this evening; no, it hasn’t rung at all. 
I’ve been rather expecting a call, but the wire’s 
been perfectly clear since nine. . . . What? 

. . . I can’t hear—there’s a singing on the 

wires. . . . What? . . . . No, the re¬ 

ceiver hasn’t been off; I’m sorry that you’ve had 
so much trouble getting us, but I really think that 

there’s some mistake—perhaps the maids-” 

She bit her lip, with a glance of despairing amuse¬ 
ment at Devon. “Why, yes, it’s possible that 
someone else has been trying to get a call through 
to me, but none has come through. . . . Yes, 

it might have been long distance. . . . What? 

You’ve been trying for an hour? Well, that really 
isn’t my fault, is it? If you’ll tell me what you 
want. ... I can’t hear; please speak a little 
louder. . . . No, it doesn’t make any differ¬ 

ence whether any one else is here or not, you can 
give the message to me. I’m quite as capable of 
hearing what you have to say as any one else. 

. . . No, I most certainly will not; please tell 

me what you want, or I shall simply ring off. 

. . . Yes. Yes. I can hear. . . . Oh, 

its Headquarters. Well, you can tell for yourself 
that the telephone’s not working well; there’s that 
singing on the wires and every now and then it 




LONG DISTANCE 


97 


buzzes, too. I suppose it’s this storm; I’m so glad 
you’re working on it. Do see if there’s not some¬ 
thing that you can do; I am expecting an important 
call any minute. Can’t one of your men? . . . 

Well, then, whnt on earth did you call up for? I do 

think that this service- Oh -” Her voice 

died suddenly in her throat, and at the look in her 
eyes Devon leapt to his feet. 

“Here, Anne—give it to me!” 

She shook her head, fighting desperately to get 
back her voice. 

“No, no—wait. . . . Yes, I heard you per¬ 

fectly—yes, Police Headquarters. I didn’t un¬ 
derstand. It’s some mistake, of course. . . . 

No. . . . No, he’s not here. . . . Well, 

then, if you knew that, what do you want? . . . 

I don’t know where—I don’t know, I tell you. 
. . . I can’t hear you—please spell. . . . 

Green’s? Breen’s? . . . No, I never heard of 

such a place. . . . No, I don’t know who he 

went with; it was some kind of a party—some kind 
of a . . . Who? . . . Lola? Lola what? 

No, no, never mind—I never heard of her—never. 
. . . Please—please wait a minute—I want to 

ask you a question—just one. Please. I’ve an¬ 
swered all of yours, haven’t I? . . . Then— 

where is Mr. Carver? Where is he? . . . No, 

no, you know where he is—you do—you do—you 










98 LONG DISTANCE 

do! You have to tell me—You have to—you . . . 
Hal! Hair 

She thrust the telephone toward him, the frantic 
voice slipping and stumbling in its haste. 

“Make them tell you—you’re a man—make 

them—make them-” 

Her teeth were chattering so violently that the 
words were lost; she clung to the table edge, shaken 
with a dreadful and racking tremor, her tortured 
eyes fastened on his face. 

“What the devil do you mean, calling up at this 
hour of the night?” demanded Devon violently. 
“I don’t care who you are; it’s a damned outrage, 
ringing up a woman at this hour and frightening 
the heart out of her. One of your dirty charges 
for speeding, I’ll bet. ... If you’ve got Mr. 
Carver there, send him to the ’phone and send 
him quick. . . . Well, if it comes down to 

that, I don’t like your tone, either. . . 

What? . . . What? . . . Oh, report and 
be damned; you’re going to get a report on yourself 
that’ll blow the inside of your head out. . . . 

Well, get me Mr. Carver then and snap into it. 
. . . I can’t hear. . . . Where is he then? 
. . . Where? . . . Oh, speak louder— 

where is he? . . . What? . . .” 

There was a moment of absolute silence, and 
then he spoke again, very quietly. 



LONG DISTANCE 


99 


“Yes, I heard you; I heard you perfectly—be 
good enough not to shout. . . . Yes. . . . 

No, I’ll explain to Mrs. Carver. . . . Well, I 

can’t give you credentials over the telephone, but 
I have known Mr. and Mrs. Carver for years; I 
was at school with him—yes. My name’s Devon. 
. . . D-e-v-o-n. Henry Devon. . . . Yes, 

I’ll drop in to see you to-morrow. . . . 

No, you can’t speak to Mrs. Carver—no, that’s 
final. I’d be much obliged if you’d give me any 
details that you have. Just run over the facts. 
. . . Yes. ... I didn’t get that. . . . 

Oh—blonde. . . . No, I couldn’t tell you. 

. . . No, you’re on the wrong track; there 

has been no trouble of any kind between them. 

. . Well, there isn’t any explanation—not 

any; it’s—it’s. . . . Look here, give me your 

number and I’ll call up again in a few minutes. 
. . . Yes. 5493? . . . oh, 53! . . .In 

about fifteen minutes. . . . Yes.” 

He placed the receiver slowly on the hook, and 
stood staring down at the little black instrument 
that had been so vocal, and now was dumb. 

“ Hal? ” The voice was not more than a breath, 
but at its sound he shuddered, as though he were 
cold. “Hal?” 

“Sit down, Anne; here, I’ll pull it closer to the 


fire—that’s it.” 



100 


LONG DISTANCE 


44 Hal, what did that man say? Has there been 
an accident?” 

“Something like that.” 

“Is Derry—hurt?” 

“Yes, dear.” 

She sat quite still, only her fingers stirring, draw- 
ing the silken tassel on her girdle back and forth, 
back and forth. 

“Is Derry—dead, Hal?” 

“Yes, dear.” 

She let the girdle slip from her fingers, lifting her 
hands to push back the weight of hair from her 
forehead with a small sigh, like a tired child. 

“I think it’s just some mistake, don’t you, 
Hal?” 

“I wish to God that I could think so.” 

“Well—but what made them think it was 
Derry?” 

4 4 He had letters—cards—initials on his cigarette 
case.” 

44 Oh, yes, it’s a diamond-shaped monogram— 
awfully pretty. I gave it to him last Christmas; 
you can’t think how pleased he was. D.H.C.— 
Derrick Horn Carver- Who was Lola?” 

“She was a—a girl who was with him.” 

“Was she? Where did it happen?” 

“In New Jersey, somewhere this side of Prince¬ 
ton.” 



LONG DISTANCE 


101 


“Please tell me just what happened. Did an¬ 
other automobile hit them?” 

“No.” 

After a long moment she said again in that 
dreadful, gentle little voice. 

“Well? Then what was it? I’m waiting.” 

“Anne, I don’t know how to tell you. I’d 
rather have the heart torn out of my body then 
tell you. Wait-” 

“I’m through waiting. Is it as bad as that? 
Hurry up, please. What happened? Where did 
they find him?” 

“In a road-house near Princeton—a place called 
Breen’s.” 

“Was he alone?” 

“No—there was a girl with him. They don’t 
know who she was; her handkerchief had ‘Lola’ on 
it.” 

“Had she killed him?” 

“No.” 

“How do they know she hadn’t?” 

i 

“Because she was shot herself—in the back.” 

“Then who killed him?” 

“They-” Pie set his teeth, the sweat 

standing out on his forehead. “I’m not going 
to tell you any more about it now. Wait— 
wait-” 

“If you don’t tell me, I’m going out through 






102 LONG DISTANCE 

that door and walk until I get to New York. Who 
killed him?” 

“They say he killed himself.” 

“Killed himself? I never heard of such ridicu¬ 
lous nonsense.” She was speaking as quietly and 
evenly as though she were discussing the labour 
problem, frozen to a calm more terrible than any 
madness. “Why should he have killed himself?” 1 

“My God, how do I know? There was no one 
else to kill him—the pistol was still in his hand.” 

“Where were the rest of the party?” 

“There was no one else in the party. The pro¬ 
prietor said that they came alone, arrived at about 
nine and ordered supper—it was after ten when 
they heard the shots.” 

“The proprietor probably did it himself,” said 
Anne Carver softly. “You let them say these 
things about Derry without contradiction—you, 
who know that he would die rather than give pain 
to any wretched little animal that lives?” 

“I can’t believe it, Anne. I can’t believe it— 
but what else in God’s name can I believe?” 

“You can believe what you please; and you evi¬ 
dently please to believe something more filthy 
than any nightmare that I have ever had.” 

“You are being extraordinarily cruel, Anne. 
What explanation do you give?” 

“There are a thousand. Robbery-” 



LONG DISTANCE 


103 


“But nothing that he had was touched-” 

“He was protecting the girl-” 

“Against whom?” 

“It might have been blackmail—it might have 
been a maniac; it might have been anything, any¬ 
thing, anything but the thing that you think. If 
Derry were here he would strike you dead for what 
you believe of him. I wish that he were here to 
strike you dead.” 

“I wish it, too. Believe me, life does not very 
greatly appeal to me at present.” 

“Did you think that if you destroyed my faith 
in him I would fall weeping into your arms?” she 
asked smoothly. “Spare yourself the trouble. 
I would die before I touched you with a finger, now 
that I know what you think of him.” 

“By God!” He towered suddenly above her. 
“That’s enough, I’m off. You’ll live yet to regret 
that, Anne.” 

“No—no—no—don’t leave me—don’t, don’t.” 
She caught at his arm as though she were drowning 
—slipping, slipping deeper into icy water. For a 
moment he thought that she was going to die where 
she sat in the great chintz chair. “No, no; I’ll be 
good—I’ll be good. I didn’t mean it, truly, truly. 
Hold me, hold me—you loved him, too, didn’t you, 
Hal?” 


“Yes, dear.” 





104 


LONG DISTANCE 


“If he were here he’d tell us how it happened— 
you’d see. He said it was an awfully good joke 
on him, too good to keep. He’d tell us.” 

“Yes, dear.” 

“Isn’t it too bad not to believe in God and 
Heaven and angels and Ouija boards? Then I 
could pretend that I could see him again, and that 
he would tell me. Derry believed all that kind of 
thing, but I never believed in anything but Derry 
—and now he’s gone. What time is it?” 

“A minute or so to twelve, by this clock.” 

“He didn’t keep his word, either, did he? He 
said not later than twelve—promised! Think of 
Derry breaking a promise-” 

44 Anne—Anne-’ ’ 

“Oh, I know—of course he’s dead, but still—he 
was Derry. The wind’s worse, isn’t it?” 

“Yes.” 

“When it pounces like that, you can see the 
flames flatten out; it comes down the chim¬ 
ney. Look—it’s burning lower. I’m cold—I’m 
cold-” 

“I’ll get more wood. Is it in the hall?” 

4 ‘No, let it burn out. It’s late; you must go, 
mustn’t you? I don’t want you to go—there’s too 
much wind. It sounds as though it were alive— 
it sounds as though it were the only thing alive in 
the world—listen-” 







LONG DISTANCE 


105 


She leaned far forward in the winged chair, and 
suddenly above the rush and clamour of the wind 
the telephone rang out, loudly and urgently. 
Again—again. She sat quite still, with lifted 
hand, her incredulous eyes frozen on the small 
black messenger blaring out its summons, the re¬ 
ceiver fairly quivering on the hook. Again— 
again—strident and insistent—again. Devon rose 
slowly to his feet. 

“I’ll answer it.” 

“No,” breathed Anne. “No.” 

“It’s probably Headquarters again.” 

“No,” she whispered. “No—no—it’s not Head¬ 
quarters again.” 

She stumbled out of the chair, clinging to the 
arms, groping, uncertain, like someone suddenly 
gone blind, and then in a swift rush she was past 
him, and the telephone was fast in her hands. 

“Yes,” she said clearly. “Long distance—yes, 
I know. . . . It’s Anne, dear, it’s Anne. 

. . . I can’t hear—it’s so far away—can’t you 

speak louder? Please, please. . . . Can you 

hear me? Can you? . . . Listen—listen. 

. . . I can’t hear very well—listen—you were 

going to tell me about the party. Remember? 
. . . The party—you were going to explain. 

. . . No—no—no—I can’t hear. 

Make me hear—make me hear—say it again! 



106 


LONG DISTANCE 


. . . No, no, don’t go—no, you can’t go. 

. . . No! Derry! Derry!” 

i. The terrible cry tore through the room like some¬ 
thing unchained, and Devon sprang to her. 

“Take your hands away,” she panted. “Don’t 
dare—don’t dare. . . . Central!” She 

jangled the hook frenziedly. “Central—you cut 
me off. . . . Central. . . . No, no, I 

won’t excuse it—never, never. . . . Get him 

back, I tell you—get him back. . . . No, I 

don’t know the number. . . . No—you 

mustn’t say that—you can help me. . . . 

You can. . . .” She was weeping terribly, 

throwing back her head to keep her lips clear of 
the flooding tears, stammering desperately, “No— 
no. ... It was long distance, I tell you— 
long distance—long ” 

Her voice rose—fell—was suddenly and start¬ 
lingly silent. After a long moment she let the 
receiver slip from her fingers; it swung limply 
across the blue-green draperies while she stood 
very straight, holding the telephone against her 
heart. 

“There’s no one on the line,” she said, in a small, 
formal, courteous voice. 

Devon tried to speak, failed, tried again. 

“It was a mistake?” 

“Oh, no.” She smiled forgivingly at him. “It 





LONG DISTANCE 


107 


wasn’t a mistake; it was Derry. He wanted to 
explain to me, but I couldn’t hear. It was my 
fault, you see—I couldn’t hear.” 

She stood quite still, stroking the small dark 
thing against her heart with light and gentle 
fingers, and then, with an infinitely caressing ges¬ 
ture, she bent her head to it—closer, closer, still 
smiling a little, as though against her curved lips 
she heard the echo of a far-off voice. 




PHILIP THE GAY 


F AIRFAX CARTER sat up very straight 
in the great carved walnut bed, and plain¬ 
tively inspected the breakfast tray which 
the red-cheeked Norman maiden had just depos¬ 
ited beside her. Those eternal little hard rolls—the 
black bowl of coffee beneath whose steaming 
fragrance lurked the treacherous chicory—the 
jug of hot thin milk—the small brown jar of pale 
honey—she bestowed a rebellious scowl on the 
entire collection. She felt suddenly, frantically 
homesick for a bubbling percolator, for thick 
yellow cream and feathery biscuits, for chilled 
crimson berries with powdered mounds of sugar. 
Marie Leontine, briskly oblivious, was coaxing the 
very small fire in the very large chimney into danc¬ 
ing animation. 

“V’la!” she announced triumphantly, with all 
the hearty deference that is the common gift of the 
French servant. “Beau matin , p’tite dame!” 

“ Oui ,” conceded the “small lady” grudgingly. 
She shivered apprehensively as Marie Leontine 
shoved the copper water jug closer to the flames, 

108 


PHILIP THE GAY 


109 


and trotted smiling from the room. Ugh! How 
in the world could any nation hope to keep clean 
and warm with three sticks of wood and four tea¬ 
spoonfuls of water? She remembered another 
country—a bright and blessed country—where 
water rushed hot and joyous from glittering 
faucets into great shining tubs—where warmed 
and fleecy towels hung waiting to fold you hospi¬ 
tably close. She shivered again, forlornly, scan¬ 
ning the stretch of distance across the bare floor 
to the hook where the meagre towel hung limp and 
forbidding. “La douce France!” Ha! She pulled 
the tray toward her, still scowling. 

Even when she scowled, Fair Carter was more 
distracting looking than any one young woman 
has a right to be. She was very small—absurdly 
small sitting bolt upright in the great dark bed—- 
but she had enough charms to equip any six ladies 
of ordinary size and aspirations. There was the 
ruffled glory of her hair, warmer than gold, 
brighter than bronze, and her rain-coloured eyes— 
and the small, warm mouth, and the elfin tilt to 
her brows. There was that look about her, eager 
and reckless and adventurous, that made your 
heart contract, when you remembered what life 
did to the eager and reckless and adventurous. 
It had made a great many hearts contract. It had 
made one despairing young adorer from Richmond 


110 


PHILIP THE GAY 


say: “Fair always looks as though she were carry¬ 
ing a flag—and listening to drums. 99 And it had 
wrung tribute from her father, who had been all 
her family and all her world, and who had adored 
her even more than the young man from Rich¬ 
mond. “She's the bravest of all the fighting Car¬ 
ters, is my Fair. And never quite so brave as 
when she's frightened. Panic arms her with really 
desperate valour!" 

The bravest of the fighting Carters swallowed 
the dregs of the coffee bowl, pushed the tray from 
her, and bestowed a sudden and enchanting smile 
on one of the dark carved figures on the bedposts. 
There were four of them, Matthew, Mark, Luke, 
and John, but she liked Mark the best. He had 
a very stern face and a little lion. 

“Morning," she saluted him affably, and if St. 
Mark's head had not been made of walnut he 
would have lost it. She had kept the most potent 
of her charms in reserve, like a true daughter 
of Eve. Fair’s extravagant prettiness might 
steel the sceptical, leading them to argue that so 
ornamental a head must necessarily be empty, 
and that no one could look that way long without 
becoming unbearably vain, spoiled, and capricious. 
But if she spoke just once—if she said any three 
indifferent words at random—the veriest sceptic 
was undone for ever. Because Fair had a Voice. 



PHILIP THE GAY 


111 


Not the coloratura kind—perhaps Patti could do 
more justice to Caro Nome —but a voice which 
Galli-Curci and the nightingale and the running 
brook and church bells and Sarah Bernhardt might 
well envy. She could sing a little—small, candle¬ 
lit songs about love, and absurdly stirring things 
that had marched down through the centuries, and 
haunting bits of lullabies—she had a trick of 
chanting them under her breath, as though it were 
to herself that she was singing. But when she 
spoke—ah, then any coloratura that ever lived 
might well shed tears of bitter envy. For the 
voice that Fair Carter used for such homely pur¬ 
poses as wishing lucky mortals good day and good 
night and God-speed was compact of magic. It 
was wine and velvet and moonlight and laughter 
and mystery—and for all its enchantment, it 
was as clear and honest as a nice little boy’s. It 
did remarkable things to the English language. 
Fair would have widened her eyes in cool disdain 
at the idea of indulging in such far-advertised 
Southern tricks as “you all” and “Ah raickon” 
and “honey lamb,” but she managed to linger over 
vowels and elude consonants in a way that did not 
even remotely suggest the frozen North. It re¬ 
duced English to such a satisfactory state of sub¬ 
mission that she only experimented half heartedly 
with any other language. A Chinaman would 



112 PHILIP THE GAY 

have understood her when she said “Please”—a 
Polynesian would have thrilled responsive to her 
“Thank you.” 

Therefore she had gone serenely on her way dur¬ 
ing those two terrible and thrilling years in France, 
those three terrible and bitter years in Germany, 
ignoring entirely the fact that the Teutons had a 
language of their own, and acquiring just enough 
of the Gallic tongue to enable her to indulge in the 
gay and hybrid banter of her beloved doughboys 
—a swift patter consisting largely of “Ah oui ,” 
“ga nefait rien” and “pas compris /” It had served 
her purpose admirably for a good five years, but 
it had proved a broken reed during the past five 
weeks. The De Lautrees were capable of speaking 
almost any kind of French—Monsieur le Vicomte 
leaned toward a nice mixture of Bossuet and 
Anatole France, Madame his ancient and regal 
mother to Marivaux with sprightly touches of 
Voltaire, Laure and Diane, to Rene Bazin when 
they were being supervised and Gyp when they 
weren’t—Philippe le Gai to a racy and thrilling 
idiom, at once virile and graceful, as old as the 
Chanson de Roland, as new as Sacha Guitry’s 
latest comedy. But after several courteous and 
tense attempts to exchange amenities with Laure’s 
“Little American” they had abandoned the tongue 
of their fathers and devoted their earnest attention 


PHILIP THE GAY 


113 


to mastering the English language. It was easy 
enough for Philippe and Laure, of course; they 
already knew a great deal more about English 
literature than Fair had dreamed existed, though 
they tripped over the spoken word, but the other 
members of the family laboured sternly and 
industriously, while their small guest surveyed 
their efforts with indulgent amusement. It 
seemed quite natural and reasonable to Fairfax 
Carter they they should continue to do so indef¬ 
initely—they wanted to talk to her, didn’t they? 
Well, then! They were getting on quite well, too, 
she reflected benevolently, still smiling at St. 
Mark, who stared back at her so unresponsively 
that she suddenly ceased to smile. 

“I suppose you don’t understand English, 
either?” she demanded severely. “’Bout time 
a little old thing like you started to learn it, I 
should think!” 

Her eye wandered to the travelling clock ticking 
competently away on the desk, and rested there 
for an electrified second. 

“Mercy!” she murmured, appalled, and was out 
of the bed and across the room with all the swift 
grace of a kitten. Half-past nine, and the De 
Chartreuil boys were to ride over for a game of 
“croquo-golf” at ten! Her toes curled rebel- 
liously at the contact of the cold flags, but she 


114 


PHILIP THE GAY 


ignored them stoically, pouncing on the copper 
jug and whirling across the room like a small, 
bright tempest. What a divine day, chanted her 
heart, suddenly exultant, as she splashed the water 
recklessly and tumbled into her clothes. It was 
wonderful to feel almost well again—to feel weari¬ 
ness slipping from her like a worn-out garment. 
The sun came flooding in through the deep win¬ 
dows, gilding the faded hangings—gilding the 
vivid head—she could hear horses’ hoofs beneath 
her window, and she flung it wide, leaning far 
out. 

“Bonjour. Monsieur Raoul — bonjour, Monsieur 
AndrS ! Oh, Laure, are you down already?” 

“Already? This hour, small lazy one! Quick 
now, or we leave thee!” 

“No, no,” wailed Fair. “I’ll be there—I’m 
almost there now, truly. Save the red mallet for 
me, angel darling—it’s the only one I can hit with. 
Don’t let her go. Monsieur Andre!” 

“Never and never. Mademoiselle. We are 
your slaves.” 

She knotted her shoe-laces with frantic fingers, 
snatched up the brown tarn from the table, and 
raced down the corridor between the swaying 
tapestries like a small wild thing. But half way 
down she halted abruptly. Behind one of the 
great doors someone was singing, gay and ringing 


PHILIP THE GAY 115 

and reckless, a gallant thing, that set her heart 
flying. 


“Monsieur Ckarette a dit a ces Messieurs 
Monsieur Charette d dit -” 

Philippe le Gai was singing the old Vendee 
marching song that he had translated for her the 
day before. 

For a moment she wavered and then, thrusting 
her hands deep in her pockets, she took a long 
breath. “Morning, Monsieur Philippe!” she 
challenged clearly. 

The song broke off, and Fair could see him, for 
all the closed doors—could see his shining black 
head and the dark young face with its recklessly 
friendly smile, and its curiously unfriendly eyes, 

gray and quiet. She could see- The blithe 

voice rang out again. 

“And a most good morning to Mistress Fairy 
Carter! Where is she going, with those quick 
feet?” 

“She’s going to play croquo-golf with Laure and 
Diane and the De Chartreuils. It’s such a heaven¬ 
ly beautiful day. You—you aren’t coming?” 

“But never of this life!” laughed the voice. 
“How old you think we in here are, hein? Seven? 
Eight? We have twenty-nine years and thirty- 
nine gray hairs—we don’t play with foolish chil- 




116 


PHILIP THE GAY 


dren. Only fairies can do that! You be careful 
of the ball going by old Daudin’s farm, see; there’s 
a sacred traitor of a ditch just over the hill—hit 
him hard and good, that ball, and maybe you 
clear it. Maybe you don’t, too! It is one animal 
of a ditch!” The light, strong laughter swept 
through the door, and Fair swayed to it as though 
it were a hand that pulled her. Then she turned 
away with a brave lift to her head. 

“Thanks a lot—I’ll be careful. See you this 
afternoon, then.” 

But the light feet finished their journey down 
the gray corridor and the worn flight of stone steps 
in an ominously sedate fashion. No, it was no 
use; it was no use at all. She felt suddenly dis¬ 
couraged and baffled, she who a few minutes be¬ 
fore had been a candle, brave and warm and shin¬ 
ing—only to have a careless breath blow out the 
light, leaving nothing but a cold little white stick 
with a dead black wick for a heart. It was hor¬ 
ribly unfair, and someone should most certainly 
pay for it; someone who was sitting blithe and 
callous and safe behind those heavy doors—heavy 
doors of oak, and heavier ones of cool indifference. 
She drew a quivering breath, and straightened, as 
though she had heard far off a bugle sing. Oh, how 
dared he, how dared he be indifferent? He, who 
idled all his life away, paying no tribute to the 


PHILIP THE GAY 


117 


world save laughter, a useless, black-haired, ar¬ 
rogant young good-for-nothing? How dared he 
be indifferent to beauty and riches and grace and 
wit and kindness, when they lingered at his side, 
tremulous and expectant? It was worse than 
cruel to be indifferent to the personification of all 
these attributes—it was crass, intolerable stupid¬ 
ity. She made a sudden violent gesture, pushing 
something far from her. That dream was ended; 
she was through. She would tell them to-night 
that her visit was over—that to-morrow she must 
be on her way to Paris—and America. 

But at the thought of America her feet faltered 
to a halt, as though she were reluctant to go one step 
nearer to that enchanted country, empty now and 
strange, since Dad had gone. How could she go 
back to that great house with its white pillars and 
echoing halls?—how could she face its cold and 
silent beauty without his arms about her? No, 
no, she couldn’t—she was afraid—she was afraid 
of loneliness. While she had had her work, while 
she had had those thousands of brown young faces 
lifted to her in comradeship and worship and 
mirth, she had fought off the nightmare of his 
going. No one had known but Laure—Laure 
who had loved “the little American” from the first 
day that she had come laughing and tiptoeing 
down the long room with contraband chocolates for 


PHILIP THE GAY 


il8 

Laure’s bitter, dying poilus—Laure who had held 
her in her tired young arms all the terrible night 
after the cable came—Laure who had wept when 
a tearless and frozen Fair had set off for Germany 
with her division—Laure who had come all the way 
to Coblenz to bring her back to Normandy when 
she had literally dropped in her tracks two years 
later. Dear Laure, who had healed and tended 
this small alien, she would be loath to leave her go. 

Fair’s lip quivered; she felt suddenly too small 
and solitary to face a world that could play such 
hideous tricks. It was bad enough and thrice in¬ 
credible to have rendered Laure’s brother impervi¬ 
ous to her every enchantment, but it was sheer 
wanton cruelty to have made him utterly unworthy 
of any lady’s straying fancy—and alas, alas, how 
fancy strayed! The bravest of all the fighting 
Carters was badly frightened; the whole thing 
savoured of black magic. She, who had flouted and 
flaunted every masculine heart that had been 
laid at her feet since she had put on slippers, to 
have fallen, victim to a laugh and a careless word! 
Why, she barely knew him, he held so lightly 
aloof, courteous and smiling and indifferent; it was 
hatefully obvious that he preferred his own society 
to any that they could offer. He wouldn’t play— 
he wouldn’t work—he wouldn’t even eat with 
them. Of course he had been in the hospital for 



PHILIP THE GAY 


119 


ages, but he had been out of it for ages, too, and 
it was criminal folly to continue to pamper any one 
as he was pampered. A man—a real man —would 
die of shame before he would permit his sisters to 
give music lessons while he locked himself in his 
room and laughed. Never was he with them, 
save for the brief hour after dejeuner when they 
drank their cups of black coffee under the golden 
beech trees—and for that heavenly space after 
dinner in the great salon, full of firelight and candle¬ 
light and falling rose-leaves and music, with 
Madame de Lautrec stitching bright flowers into 
her tapestry frame and Monsieur le Vicomte smil¬ 
ing his courteous and tragic smile into the leaping 
fire in the carved chimney, and the fresh young 
voices rising and falling about the piano over which 
Laure bent her golden head—Diane’s silver 
music lifting clearly, Laure’s soft contralto mur¬ 
muring like far waters, and Philippe singing as his 
troubadour ancestor might have sung, fearless 
and true and shining—Fair caught her breath at 
the memory of that ringing splendour, and then 
looked stern. It was ridiculous to worship any 
one as the De Lautrecs worshipped their tall 
Philippe and it was obviously highly demoralizing 
for him—highly. Laure was the worst; it was as 
though she couldn’t bear to have him out of her 
sight for a minute; if he rose to go—oh, if he even 


120 


PHILIP THE GAY 


stirred, she was at his side in a flash, her hand 
slipped into his, all her white tranquillity shaken 
into some mysterious terror at the thought that he 
might escape her again. 

“No, no!” she would cry passionately when Fair 
rallied her with flying laughter. “You do not 
know what you say, my Fair. I have no courage 
left; none, none, I tell you. He is my life—and 
for four years every morning, every night I made 
myself say: ‘You will not see him again, you will 
not hear him again, you will not touch him again. 
But you will be brave, you hear? You will be 
brave because it is for France/ Now France has 
no more need of my courage—and that is very well, 
because I have no more to give her. It is all gone. 
I will never be brave again.” 

She was the only one that Philippe would suffer 
to come near him in all the long hours that he 
spent behind those dark barred doors; often, as 
Fair sped by on light feet, she could hear the mur¬ 
mur of their voices, low and absorbed—shutting 
her out, thought Fair forlornly, more than any 
lock on any door. What did they find to talk 
about, hour after hour, blind and deaf to the 
world that lay about them, golden under the 
October sun? What spell did Laure use to bind 
him, what magic to dispel all the endless witchery 
that Fair had spread before him, first carelessly. 




PHILIP THE GAY 


121 


then startled into wide-eyed consciousness and 
finally, during these last flying days, driven to 
despairing prodigality? She bit her lip, blinking 
back the treacherous tears fiercely. Some day— 
some day he should pay for this indifference, and 
pay with interest. The loitering feet paused 
again while their owner visualized, through the 
mist of unwelcome tears, a contrite Philippe drag¬ 
ging himself to grovel abjectly at her feet, begging 
for one small word of mercy and of hope. The 
vivid countenance suddenly assumed an expres¬ 
sion of exquisite contentment. 

“No, Philippe/’ she would tell him, lightly but 
inflexibly, “no, my poor boy, it would be sheer 
cruelty to mislead you. Never, under any cir¬ 
cumstances could I-” 

“ Enfin /” rang out a richly indignant voice. 
“Do you walk in your sleep, my good goose? We 
wait and we wait until we are one half frozen, and 
you arrive like the snail he was your little brother 
and-” 

“Oh, Laure, I am sorry! Box my ears—no, 
hard—you tell her to box them hard. Monsieur 
Andre!” 

“I, Mademoiselle? But never—I think we 
are well repaid for our vigil, hey, Raoul? Here is 
that very red mallet with which you will beat us 
all. We take Bravo with us, Diane?” 





122 


PHILIP THE GAY 


Diane shook her curly head dubiously at the 
frantic police dog. 

“Who holds the leash; you, Andre? Last time 
he get loose, he bite three sheep—three, before 
we catch him. You hear, monster?” 

Fair and Bravo exchanged guilty glances. 

“Well, but Diane, he pulled so; truly he did. He 
went so fast, right over those hedges, and the 
leash cut through my mittens, and-” 

Laure and Diane yielded to outrageous laughter. 

“Raoul, you should see them! Right over those 
sticking hedges they go, Bravo ahead, big like 
three wolves, and Fair ’way behind at the other end 
of the leash, so small like the little Red Riding 
Hood, and so fast like she was flying! Oh, bon 
Dieu! I thought we die laughing!” 

“Very, very funny,” commented Fair bitterly. 
“Specially for me. How are we going to-day?” 

“How if we go across the little meadow to the 
Gates and home by the Cceur d’Or? Too far, 
Raoul?” 

% 

“We will be back for lunch? A la bonheur —we 
go. Ah, well hit. Mademoiselle. Straight like 
arrows, too!” 

Fair raced after the red ball, her scarf flying 
behind her like a banner, wings at her heels, stars 
in her eyes, tragedy forgotten. 

Three more strokes like that would get her to 




PHILIP THE GAY 


ns 


the meadow—oh, wonderful to be alive, to be 
swift and light and sure, to feel the wind lifting 
your hair, and the sun warming your heart in a 
world that was once more safe and kind. Dear 
world—dear France, dear France, so kind to this 
small American—she absolved it lavishly from its 
sins of cold water and bitter coffee; where else in 
all the world could you find a game of the inspiring 
simplicity of croquo-golf—a game whose sole equip¬ 
ment was a ball and a mallet—whose sole object 
was to cover as much space in as few strokes as 
possible? Where else could you find such comrades 
to play it with, grave and eager as children, ardent¬ 
eyed and laughing-lipped? She smote the ball 
aga ; n, her voice flying with it. 

“Oh, Laure, as I live and breathe, it’s cleared 
the ditch! 

‘Monsieur Charette hath said to all his peers. 
Monsieur Charette hath said to all his peers, 

Come, good sirs! 

Now let us sally forth and whip these curs!’” 

The exultant chant wavered for a moment as 
the proud possessor of the ball cleared the ditch, 
too, and took up her triumphant lilt, crescendo: 

“‘Take up thy gun, my good Gregory! 

Take up thy virgin of ivory— 

Fill up thy drinking gourd right cheerily— 

Our comrades have gone down 
To fight for Paris Town!”’ 



124 


PHILIP THE GAY 


Andre de Chartreuil swung up beside her, 
breathless and laughing. Luck was with him; 
all the English that he had mastered as liaison 
officer raced to the tip of his tongue. 

“But what a child! How old are you. Mile. 
Fairfax Carter?” 

“Too old,” mourned Fairfax, shaking her bright 
head till the curls danced in the sun. “Much, 
much too old—old enough to know better.” She 
pounced on the half-buried ball with a small shriek 
of excitement. “Ah ha, my little treasure, a mere 
turn of the wrist and—bet I make the gate in 
four strokes.” 

“Bet you do not,” replied Andre obligingly. 

“Done; all the mushrooms that you find in Dau- 
din’s meadow to—to what?” 

“To the very great privilege of kissing the tips 
of your fingers.” Young De Chartreuil’s voice 
was carefully light. 

“Monsieur Andre! ” Fair, her mallet poised for 
the blow, paused long enough to bestow a distract¬ 
ing glance through her lashes, oddly at variance 
with her maternal tone. “ You aren’t going to begin 
that kind of thing, are you?” Her laughter rang 
out, gay and lovely and mocking. 

Young De Chartreuil smiled back at her—a not 
very convincing smile. She w T as the most en¬ 
chanting creature that he had ever met, but 


PHILIP THE GAY 125 

her lack of discretion froze the marrow in his 
bones. 

“Mademoiselle, one so charming is privileged 
to forget that one may also be kind,” he remarked 
formally. 

Fair stopped laughing. “Oh, nonsense!” she 
returned abruptly, forgetting that one may also be 
polite. She hit viciously at the ball, scowling after 
it more like a cross little boy than a lady of 
Romance. “There—see what you made me do!” 
The astonished Andre met her accusing gaze 
blankly. 

“I, Mademoiselle?” 

“Yes, sir, you.” The tone was unrelenting. 
“I’m a great deal kinder than I have any business 
being,” she added darkly. “I certainly am. 
Sooner or later every single one of you turn on 
me like—like—vipers, and tell me that it’s not 
possible that I could have been so everlastingly 
kind and patient and wonderful if I hadn’t meant 
something by it. Goodness knows what you’d 
all like me to do,” she murmured gloomily. “ Make 
faces and bark like a dog every time one of you 
comes near me, I s’pose. Where’s that ball? I 
wish I were dead.” 

This time Andre’s smile was clearly unforced. 

“Oh, no one in the world is droll like you!” he 
stated with conviction. “But no one. No, do 





126 


PHILIP THE GAY 


not bark like a little dog—I will be good, I swear.” 
He shrugged his shoulders philosophically. “After 
all, if God had made you tender hearted you would 
spend your days weeping for the ones you broke. 
So this way it is best, is it not so?” 

Fair beamed on him graciously. “Well, of 
course! ” she assented with conviction. “And I’m 
certainly thankful that you see it. If you’d had 
about seventy-eight thousand soldiers spending 
their every waking minute telling you that they’d 
fade away and die if you weren’t kind to them, 
you’d see that the novelty of it would wear off 
a little. Wear off a good deal.” She gave the 
ball a rather perfunctory hit. After all, Fairfax 
Carter on the subject of Fairfax Carter was more 
absorbing than any game ever invented. She 
drew a deep breath and started off headlong on her 
favourite topic. “It’s perfectly horrible being a 
girl—and it’s a million times worse if you’re a— 
well, if you aren’t exactly revolting looking and 
are what the dime novels call an heiress.” 

“It must, indeed, be hard,” agreed young De 
Chartreuil consolingly. 

Fair glanced at him suspiciously from the corner 
of her eye. 

“You needn’t laugh, my dear boy—it most 
certainly is. I don’t believe men care one little 
snip for your soul or—or your intellect.” 


PHILIP THE GAY 127 

“Oh, but surely!” protested De Chartreuil 
politely. 

“No, sir,” maintained the complete cynic, giving 
another abstracted hit at the ball. “Not a single, 
solitary one. Oh, bother—look where it went 
then! How many strokes have you had? Four? 
Four? I’ve had five, and look at the horrible 
thing now. What was I talking about? Oh, 
proposals! I don’t believe in international mar¬ 
riages, do you. Monsieur Andre?” 

Monsieur Andre made a light and deprecating 
gesture. “I, Mademoiselle? But I have had so 
few!” 

“I do think foreigners are horribly frivolous!” 
murmured Fair to the universe at large. “I’ve 
not had so many myself, but I can still think 
they’re a bad idea. You couldn’t possibly help 
thinking that they were pretty cold and calculat¬ 
ing.” 

“Could you not?” inquired one who had 
come very near being a eo'd calculator in a freezing 
voice. “I, for one, try to look more charitably 
on the pretty ladies who covet our poor coronets.” 

Fair brushed this thrust aside with the obli¬ 
viousness that made her strength and her weakness 
once the engine of her attention was racing along 
her one-track mind to the goal of her selection. 
Humour, satire, impertinence, or indignation were 


128 


PHILIP THE GAY 


signals powerless to impede her progress when she 
was on her way; she rushed by them heedlessly, 
recklessly indifferent to anything short of a head- 
on collision. 

“Oh, I wasn’t thinking of the girls—who in the 
world wants a little old coronet! Of course they’re 
nice if you’re used to them,” she added hastily. 
“But it was the men that I was thinking of; you 
simply couldn’t be sure, not ever. You work, 
don’t you?” 

“Alas, yes, Mademoiselle!” De Chartreuil aban¬ 
doned resentment and stood leaning on his mallet, 
laughing down at this incorrigible and enchanting 
small barbarian. 

“Monsieur Andre, why do you suppose that 
Monsieur de Lautrec doesn’t work? ” 

“Philippe?” His voice was strange. 

“Yes, Philippe—you didn’t suppose that I 
meant the Vicomte, did you? This place keeps 
him busy from morning to night. Philippe, of 
course.” Her voice was impatient, but there was 
a desperate eagerness behind it that checked the 
quick words on De Chartreuil’s tongue. 

“Mademoiselle, for four years he worked day 
and night; he gave the blood of his heart, the 
blood of his soul in work—would you grudge him 
a little rest?” 

“But, good heavens, he’s had years to rest,” 



PHILIP THE GAY 


129 


cried Fair despairingly. “He’s not going to rest 
until he dies, is he? You’re not resting—Monsieur 
Raoul’s not resting—no one in the world has a right 
to rest when there’s so much to do—no one!” 

“For long, long after the war he did not leave 
the hospital. Mademoiselle.” 

“Well, wasn’t he resting there?” demanded his 
inquisitor fiercely. 

“No,” replied the boy gravely. “No, he was 
not resting there, I think.” 

“What—what was the matter with him in the 
hospital?” asked Fair, making her lips into a very 
straight line so that they wouldn’t quiver. 

“It was—what you call shell-shock.” 

“Shell-shock? That’s horrible—oh, don’t I 
know! Those hospitals—like a nightmare—worse 

than a nightmare-” She swept it far from her 

with a resolute gesture. “It’s no good thinking 
about it; you have to forget! And Heaven knows 
that he’s over it now; Heaven knows that now he 
isn’t suffering from any breakdown. I’ve never 
seen him look even serious for two minutes at a 
time—I don’t believe that he has the faintest idea 
of what seriousness means. It’s all very well to 
have a sense of humour; I have a perfectly won¬ 
derful sense of humour myself when I’m not think¬ 
ing of something more important—but it’s ridic¬ 
ulous to think that that’s all there is to it!” She 








130 


PHILIP THE GAY 


hit the ball a reckless blow that sent it flying far 
across the tawny meadow, and turned to young 
De Chartreuil a lovely little countenance on fire 
with righteous indignation and angry distress. 
“A real man would know that life ought to be 
more than just laughing half the day—and singing 
half the night—and looking the way the heroes in 
the moving pictures ought to look—and chatter¬ 
boxing away in his room for hours and hours and 
hours!” Bitter resentment at this unpalatable 
memory sent the colour flying higher in her cheeks, 
and she swung off after the red ball at a furious 
scamper. “And by Glory, I’m going to tell him 
so!” she announced tempestuously over her shoul¬ 
der to the astounded Andre. He sprang forward, 
galvanized into instant action. 

“Mademoiselle—Mademoiselle, wait, I beg you. 
You jest, of course, but-” 

“Indeed I do not jest, of course,” retorted Fair 
hotly. “I don’t jest one little bit. Why in the 
world shouldn’t I tell him?” 

“There are, I should think, one thousand rea¬ 
sons why,” he replied sharply. “Must I give you 
the thousand and first, and assure you that always, 
always, all the days that you live, it would be to 
you a very deep regret?” 

“It certainly would not,” replied his unim¬ 
pressed audience flatly. Any one who attempted 




PHILIP THE GAY 


131 


to frighten Fair out of any undertaking whatever 
was making a vital strategic error, but Andre de 
Chartreuil was too young and too thoroughly out¬ 
raged to indulge in strategy. 

“ Mademoiselle, but this is madness-” 

“Monsieur, but this is impertinence.” Fair’s 
chin was tilted at an angle that implied that battle, 
murder, and sudden death would be child’s play to 
her from then on. This—this little whipper-snapper 
of a French infant who had basely pretended to 
be at her feet, suddenly rising up and dictating a 
course of conduct to her—to her! Well, it simply 
proved what she had always maintained. You 
couldn’t trust a foreigner—you couldn’t, not ever. 

“For what you call impertinence, forgive me.” 
The tone was far from repentant, and Fair waited 
stiffly for further developments. “My poor 
English renders me clumsy—grant me, I pray, 
patience.” 

Very poor English, thought Fair sternly; it 
might mean anything. Grant him patience in¬ 
deed! She had precious little patience to spare 
for any one this morning, as he would discover to 
his cost. 

“Philippe, he is like no one else!” Young De 
Chartreuil made a gesture of impotent despair, his 
careful English suddenly turned traitor. “You 
do not see it, but he is like no one else, I tell you. 



PHILIP THE GAY 


132 

I 

I who was his sous-officier—his how you call it, 
his under-officer—ah, no matter—he was my cap¬ 
tain for three years, and I know, you hear me, I 
know.” 

“Heaven knows I hear you,” Fair assured him 
with ominous calm. “I should think that they 
could hear you in Paris!” 

“Well, then, I tell you that we, his men, we who 
followed him, we would have given the blood out 
of our hearts for him to shine his boots with—we 
knew him, we. You know why they call him 
Philippe le Gai?” 

“I know that there’s some story about an old 
troubadour called Philippe le Gai-” 

“About a very great soldier who was also a very 
great singer. Mademoiselle, long years ago in 
Provence. Philippe is of his race; one of those 
who meet Death itself with a song. That other 
Philippe died eight hundred years ago, and they 
say that he died singing. And we—we who fol¬ 
lowed this Philippe and gave to him our souls— 
we know that he could face worse than death—and 
still sing.” 

“There isn’t the slightest necessity of making a 
curtain speech to me about courage,” replied the 
last of the fighting Carters, and the velvet voice 
rang as cold and hard as drawn steel. “I know 
quite a good deal about it, thank you. I may not 






PHILIP THE GAY 


133 


have had any old ancestor that went rampaging 
around singing songs about how gay and brave 
and wonderful he was, but I had three great-uncles 
and a grandfather who were killed in the Civil 
War and a brother who was killed in the Spanish 

War, and—and a father-” Her voice failed 

her, but she swallowed hard and pushed on relent¬ 
lessly: “And a father who died for his country 
just as much as any of them, because he went 
right on working for it when he knew that it would 
kill him—and who didn’t even let me know that 
he was dying, because I couldn’t help him, and he 
thought that I might help America, and I was the 
only one of the Carters left to fight for America. 
And I kept on fighting, even though it just about 
killed me, too; I went into Germany with my men, 
because I knew that he wouldn’t think the war 
was over until we got what we fought for—until 
we really got it—and I’d be there yet if it hadn’t 
been for those idiotic doctors. Nervous break¬ 
down! For gracious sakes, I’d like to hear what 
they’d say if one of their old colonels started to 
have a nervous breakdown. This isn’t any kind of 
a world to sit and twirl your thumbs and pet your 
nerves in—and I can’t see that singing about it 
makes it much nobler—or laughing, either.’’ 

“There are many things, perhaps, that you 
cannot see,” commented young De Chartreuil, and 




134 


PHILIP THE GAY 


at the tone in his voice there was one thing that 
Fair did see, and that was red. 

“Well, I can see this,” she cried in a voice shaken 
with sheer fury, “I can see that it’s possible to 
be just as much of a slacker after the war as during 
it.” 

‘ ‘ Mademoiselle! ’ ’ 

“In America men work ,” stormed Fair. 
“They-” 

“In America you save your generosity for your 
own faults, it seems.” He raised a commanding 
hand, and Fair stood voiceless, literally transfixed 
with rage. “No, wait, I beg you; I have not yet 
finished. Perhaps in your great country you for¬ 
get that work is the means—that it is not the end; 
no, no, believe me, it is not the end. It is also not 
very wise to condemn utterly that which may 
differ only in kind, not in degree. To you courage 
may be a dark and stern thing—a duty—but to 
some—to one at least, Mademoiselle—it is a shin¬ 
ing and gay and splendid gift; it is a joy.” 

“Are you through with your lessons for the 
day?” asked Fair icily. “Because if you are, I’m 
going!” She whirled the red mallet about her 
head like a battle-axe, and sent it spinning far 
from her after the neglected ball. “Good-bye— 
I’m off. Tell the others I twisted my ankle—got 
a headache—tell them any old lie you think of——” 










PHILIP THE GAY 


135 


“But, Mademoiselle, you cannot-” 

Fairfax Carter halted for a moment in her 
tumultuous progress, the wind whipping her leaf- 
brown skirts about her and sending the bright 
curls flying about the reckless, stubborn little face. 

“Can’t I?” she called back defiantly. “Can’t 
I? Well, wait and see! I’m going to tell your 
precious Philippe de Lautrec just exactly what I 
think of a hero who spends his life resting on his 
laurels while his sisters work their fingers to the 
bone—and you and Foch and the Archangel 
Gabriel can’t stop me, so I’d advise you to stick 
to croquo-golf. Good-bye!” 

She was gone in a brilliant whirl of flying skirts 
and scarf and hair. Young De Chartreuil watched 
her disappearing down the long hill that led past 
Daudin’s farm to the far gate of the chateau with 
an expression in which dismay was tempered by 
a grim satisfaction. After a moment he shrugged 
his shoulders briefly, retrieved the scarlet ball 
and mallet, and set off slowly toward the sounds 
of distant laughter that marked the other players. 
Well, let her go; she was richly in need of a lesson, 
that lovely little demon! And to think that for a 
moment he had dreamed—ah, name of Heaven, 
what an escape!- 

Fair, in the meantime, raced lightly on her 
chosen way. She was in a towering rage at De 




136 


PHILIP THE GAY 


Chartreuil for his presumptuous insolence, and in 
an even more towering rage at herself for the 
effect that it had had on her. Even immature 
reflection revealed the unmistakable fact that she 
had behaved a good deal more like a fish-wife than 
the traditional great lady. About the only things 
that she had failed to do were boxing his ears and 
screaming at the top of her lungs. And she had 
felt terribly—oh, but terribly—like doing both of 
them. No, it was all very well to have a temper, 
but it was a bad strategic error to lose it. Posses¬ 
sion is nine points of the law, especially with tem¬ 
pers. Fortunately, the hateful De Chartreuil 
child had been even worse than she. He had 
looked at one time as though it would have been 
pure ecstasy to throttle the life out of her—the 
time that she had got in that neat thrust about 
peace-time slackers. Well, she was on her way to 
tell one of them exactly what she thought of him 
as fast as her stubby brown boots would carry her. 
She wrenched impatiently at the iron latch on the 
great north gate—it yielded with an unexpected¬ 
ness that nearly threw her off her feet, and she 
heard it clang to behind her as she raced up the 
long alley of lime trees that led to the stone terrace. 
If she were lucky, she might find the object of her 
righteous wrath basking there in the sunlight, 
without so much as a book in his graceless hands, 



PHILIP THE GAY 


137 


dreaming away the hours, his dark face turned to 
the golden fields of his inheritance. She had 
found him there before—and, yes, fate was with 
her—there he was now in his great chair with his 
back to the lime trees, lounging deep. For a mo¬ 
ment she hesitated, her heart thundering in her 
ears, and then she swung recklessly across the sun- 
warmed flags, hands deep in her pockets, her chin 
tilted at an outrageous angle. 

“Oh, there you are!” she hailed in her magic 
voice, but there was something behind the 
words that turned them from a salutation to a 
challenge. 

Philippe le Gai sat quite still for a moment, and 
then, without rising, he flung her a radiant smile 
over his shoulder. 

“And there are you!” he said. “All finished, 
the croquo-golf?” 

“No—just finished for me. It’s a stupid game, 
don’t you think?” 

“Me? I think no game stupid that once I 
have started—no, not one. Then I must play it 
through to the end, or count myself defeated!” 

Fair’s eyes darkened ominously. 

“But you don’t start many games, do you?” 
she asked. 

“No,” acquiesced the young man in the chair. 
“As you say, not many.” 



138 


PHILIP THE GAY 


Fair set her teeth. Did he think that if he con¬ 
tinued to sprawl all his splendid length there, 
unmoving, that she would pass on? Was this his 
method of once more conveying to her the informa¬ 
tion that her presence was an intrusion? Oh, for 
a man—for some slim, freckled, young American— 
to take this insolent foreigner by his coat collar 
and jerk him to his unworthy feet! Perhaps it 
might be better to have two of them—he was 
disgustingly tall. She swung round the corner of 
the chair, flames dancing in her eyes. 

“Are you—very busy? ” she inquired in a danger¬ 
ously polite little voice. 

Philippe le Gai showed all of his white teeth in 
another flashing smile. 

“But no!” he replied accurately, and made a 
swift motion as though to rise, only to check him¬ 
self more swiftly. “Be seated, I pray you!” 

The look of consuming rage that Fair flashed on 
him as she seated herself in the small iron chair 
opposite him would have shrivelled a normally sen¬ 
sitive soul to gray ashes. Her impervious host, 
however, merely leaned deeper into his bright 
cushions, the smile still edging his lips. 

“Laure still plays?” 

“Yes,” replied Fair. She spoke with consider¬ 
able difficulty; the royal condescension of that 
“Be seated” had left her feeling slightly dizzy. 


PHILIP THE GAY 


139 


<fc I have here a paper which will need her sharp 
wits—she will not be long, perhaps?” 

“I don’t know,” replied Fair sombrely. Just 
how, she wondered, did you lead up to telling a 
comparative stranger that you despised him? It 
was harder than she had thought it would be, out 
there in the meadow—it was the proud turn of the 
black head, and the sure strength of the long 
brown hands, and the sheer beauty of the flashing 
smile that made it hard. No one had a right to look 
like that—and to be despicable. It wasn’t fair. 

“I think that those poor Gods in Heaven must 
envy us our earth to-day!” said the object of her 
scorn, turning his face to the deep blue of the 
autumn sky. “So warm, so cold, so sweet—like 
some mad Bacchante, bare of throat and arm for 
all her warm fur skins, with grapes of purple weigh¬ 
ing down her curls, and wine of gold tripping up 
her light heels . . . Once, you know, when I was 

the smallest of little boys, Monsieur my grandfather 
call me to come down from my sleep to drink the 
health of my very new sister—of young Laure. 
There was a great banquet, a table brave with 
fruit and flowers and lace and candles, and they 
put me onto that table, and give me a little burning 
golden brandy to drink in a great cool glass of 
crystal—and straight to my head it flew—ah, 
Dieu, the lucky, curly head! I remember still, you 



140 


PHILIP THE GAY 


see —I remember how the world must feel to-day. 
The world and I, we have been fortunate.” 

Fair’s mouth was a rose-red line of stern distaste. 
It might be all very French to take a perfectly 
good autumn day and turn it into an intoxicated 
heathen, but in her opinion, which was far from 
humble, it was simply outrageous. And those 
detestable people, giving brandy to that darling 
little boy—well, all little boys were more or less 
darling. It was their truly lamentable degenera¬ 
tion at about the age of twenty-nine that was oc¬ 
cupying her at present. She leaned forward 
swiftly, her hands very cold and her eyes very 
hot. 

“Monsieur Philippe, don’t you ever, ever get 
tired of just sitting around doing nothing ?” 

Perhaps the passion in the clear voice touched 
him—for a moment Philippe le Gai belied his 
name. Then he made a slight gesture with the 
hand that held the papers, a gesture of dismissal 
to such folly as sober thought. 

“Tired, Mistress Fairy? How should I be 
tired, doing nothing? And how are you so sure 
that I do nothing while I sit around—how are you 
so sure of that, I wonder?” 

“Because I can see you,” replied Fair with 
despairing emphasis. 

“Can you then, Wise Eyes? Can you see so 



PHILIP THE GAY 141 

well? Then you must see that it is not nothing 
that I do.” 

“Oh, isn’t it?” she whispered breathlessly, her 
heart in her voice. “Isn’t it?” 

“But never! While I sit around, I am being 
very, very busy, me, being alive—and being 
amused—and being, believe me, most eternally 
and most exultantly grateful. You call that doing 
nothing?” 

“Of course I call that doing nothing,” replied 
Fair fiercely. 

“Now that is strange—because, you know, I am 
so busy doing it that I can find time to do nothing 
else. To sit with the sun and beauty and silence 
all about, that is better than heaven, I think. Al¬ 
ways I have loved Beauty better than life and 
once I thought that I had lost her for ever—and, 
see, she is mine again! In other fields—fields 
churned to madness, horrors of white clay and red 
blood, with the proud trees stripped to dirty black 
stumps—in other fields I remembered these, and I 
swore to that god of battles that if he would send 
me back to this golden grace—to this greenness 
and kind quiet—I would ask nothing more. And 
where those stenches made the poor soul sicker 
than the body, I could sometimes hold my breath, 
and smell apple-blossoms in the spring moonlight, 
and yellow roses in the summer sunlight, and 




142 


PHILIP THE GAY 


spiced wood burning in the great chimneys, and 
cider blowing across the autumn winds. Now— 
now I need not hold the breath to smell the good 
ripe fruit, now I need not close my eyes to see my 
fields of gold, with the little warm gray sheep 
against the hills. Now I have come home to my 
fields, and I keep faith with the god of battles—I 
ask for nothing more. Look before you, Wise 
Eyes; what do you see?” 

“The alley of lime trees and the north gate and 
the meadow,” said Fair, fighting to harden the 
voice that wanted only to break. 

“Look farther-” 

“I can see the thatch on Daudin’s roof and the 
road to the village and the little steeple on the 
church.” 

‘‘ Nothing more ? 3 5 

“There’s nothing more to see.” 

“You do not see a little boy climbing that iron 
gate and racing home up that long alley, singing— 
racing quick, quick because it begins to grow 
dark?” 

“Of course I don’t see him,” replied Fair de¬ 
fiantly, but she leaned forward, straining her eyes. 

“Look farther—look far away; you cannot see 
the other little boys, many, many, all hurrying while 
they sing to get home before it is dark? No? Ah, 
poor Wise Eyes! Perhaps it is because it is years 



PHILIP THE GAY 


143 


that those little boys hurry down, instead of just 
an alley of lime trees—they are hurrying home 
clean across the centuries. Since that first Phi¬ 
lippe came singing up from the south, they have 
loved these gray stones best of all the earth—best, 
I think, of heaven. And that last little boy, he 
did not love it least, believe me. Perhaps he is 
singing louder than them all, because though they 
have made it, those others, he has saved it.” 

“He didn’t save it any more than a good many 
million other people,” commented Fair ruthlessly. 

Philippe le Gai threw back his black head with a 
ringing peal of laughter. “Truly as you say, not 
more. But that is another reason why he sings, 
believe me.” 

“But what did you do before you started in to 
save it?” pursued the remorseless inquisitor, and 
suddenly she sickened at her task. The radiance 
flagged in the dark face before her; for a moment 
Philippe le Gai looked mortally tired. 

“Me? I was an artist—an a an engineer.” He 
sat staring ahead of him, tense and straight; and 
then he relaxed easily, the smile playing again. 
“Not so good an artist, and not so bad an engineer. 
I was oh, most young, and oh, most vain, and gray¬ 
headed old gentlemen from far away came to beg 
a little advice as to what to do with their sick 


mines. 


144 


PHILIP THE GAY 


“Mines?” Fair’s face was alight. “That was 
what Dad used to do before he went in for cotton. 
It was copper, you know. D’you know about 
copper?” 

“Every kind of mine that ever was I knew 
about,” he assured her lightly. “But now I have 
forgotten.” 

“How could you?” she cried. “How could 
you, when they need you so? Don’t you think 
that that little boy would be ashamed if he could 
see you sitting on this terrace—just sitting and 
sitting like a great enormous lazy black cat? 
Don’t you?” 

“Why, no,” replied Philippe le Gai. “No, I 
do not think that he would be ashamed.” 

Fair wrung her hands together; she felt defeat 
closing about her. 

“Those fields that you talked about—don’t 
you want to make them green and golden again, 
too?” 

“They are very tired, those fields,” said the 
man. “Shall we not let them rest? ” 

“Oh!” cried Fair, and the valiant voice strug¬ 
gled and broke. “Oh, how can you—oh, oh, how 
can you?” 

“Fair-” 

He was on his feet at last—the swift move 
sent the paper flying, and it came fluttering 





PHILIP THE GAY 


145 


irresponsibly across the sunlit space between 
them, dancing to a halt almost at her feet. It had 
blown open, and her incredulous eyes were riveted 
on the letterhead—the little thick black letters 
spelling out the name of Dad’s attorney, Henry 
C. Forrester, Wall Street—she stared down 
blankly: 

Dear Sir— 

In further reply to your request for full details as to the 
fortune left Miss Carter by her father- 

A wave of scarlet swept over her from heel to 
brow; she felt as though she were drowning, she 
felt as though she were being buried alive, she 
felt as though a bolt of lightning had passed clean 
through her body, leaving her quite dead and still. 

“So that’s what you are?” she said. “You— 
you! I might have known.” 

“What I am?” His voice was touched with a 
little wonder. “No, but I do not understand; 
what is it that I am?” 

“There’s no word for you,” she told him be¬ 
tween her clicking teeth. She w T as shaking vio¬ 
lently, uncontrollably, like someone in a chill. 
“Crawling to my lawyers—you—you—a common 
adventurer- 

“You are mad,” he said. 

“It’s here,” cried Fair. “Look. It’s here in 
black and white—are you going to deny it?” 




146 


PHILIP THE GAY 


“Give me that letter,” said Philippe le Gai. 

“I wouldn’t touch it in a thousand years,” she 
flung at him. “Not in a hundred hundred thou¬ 
sand. It’s filthy—it can lie there till it rots.” 

“Pick it up,” he told her. 

“How dare you?” she whispered. “How dare 
you?” 

“It is not so very greatly daring,” he assured 
her. “Pick it up, I tell you.” 

Fair stared at him voicelessly where he stood, 
tall and splendid and terrible in the sunlight. No, 
no, this was nightmare—this was not real. It was 
not she who bent to the bidding of this relentless 
monster—it was some other Fairfax caught in a 
hideous dream. The paper rattled in her fingers 
like goblin castanets. 

“Now bring it to me.” 

She crossed the little space of sun-warmed 
bricks, her eyes fixed and brilliant as a sleep¬ 
walker. 

“Closer,” bade the still voice. “Closer yet. 
Yes. Now put it in my hand. That way—yes. 
It was not yours, you see; did you forget that?” 

Fair made no answer. She stood frozen, 
watching the brown fingers folding the bit of white 
paper into a neat oblong. 

“I would not, I think, say any word to Laure 
of this,” said the voice. “And I would not, I 



PHILIP THE GAY 147 

think, stay here longer. I would forget all this, 
and go.” 

“I am going this afternoon,” she told him 
through her stiff lips. “And I am going to tell 
Laure—everything . 5 5 

"Do not,” he said. “Do not, believe me.” He 
stood staring down at the paper, and then he 
spoke again. 

“I am, as you say, an adventurer,” said Philippe 
le Gai, in that terrible and gentle voice. “And 
adventure is, as you say, common. For which I 
thank my gods. You have nothing more to say 
to me?” 

“Nothing.” 

“Then that is all, I think, Miss Carter.” 

Obviously, the audience was over, the courtier 
was dismissed. Oh, for one word—one little, 
little word—to blast him where he stood, gentle 
and insolent and relentless. She could not find 
that word, and she would die before she would give 
him any other. The brown boots stumbled in 
their haste on the terrace steps; at the foot she 
turned once more to face him, flinging him a 
last look of terror and defiance and despair—and 
deeper than all, wonder. But Philippe le Gai’s 
face was turned once more to his golden fields. 

Far away, at the end of the long alley, she could 
see the players coming back; she could hear them. 



148 


PHILIP THE GAY 


too, laughing and calling to each other—Bravo was 
barking frenziedly, heedless of Diane’s small, 
peremptory shouts—there, he was off, with Raoul 
and Diane in pursuit, headed straight for the dis¬ 
tant stables. She clung to the stone railing for a 
moment, limp and sick, and then she flung back 
her head, spurred her flagging feet, and set off down 
the arching lime trees, running. Running because 
she was desperately tired and desperately fright¬ 
ened; because it was toward battle that she ran, 
and she must get there swiftly. Laure hailed from 
the far end. 

“Ah, small deserter, you come to surrender? 
Come quick, then, and do penance.” 

“I’ve not come to do penance,” said the de¬ 
serter. She stood very straight with her hands 
clasped tightly behind her. “I’ve come to say 
good-bye.” 

“Good-bye?” echoed Laure. “Here, Andre, 
take this mallet, this ball. What folly is this, 
Fair?” 

“It’s not folly; the folly’s been in staying. I’ve 
learned quite a lot of things in the last few minutes, 
Laure. Monsieur de Lautrec has some papers 
that he wants to show you.” 

“Papers? Well, but what is all this mystery? 
Come, now, Fair, you are not well, I know. The 
doctor he said you should not be excited.” 


PHILIP THE GAY 


149 


“I am not in the least excited,” replied Fair, 
her eyes two glittering danger signals. “Are you 
in this plot, too. Monsieur Andre?” 

“Plot? No, decidedly, this is fever! Let me 
feel your hands, mon enfant -” 

“Don’t touch me, please,” said Fair, clearly and 
distinctly. 

“Did I say fever? But it is delirium! I am 
not to touch you?” 

“No.” She took a step farther away from 
Laure who stood looking down at her, clear and 
quiet, with that incredulous lift to her brows. 
“Don’t pretend any more, please; it makes me 
rather sick. I know about everything, you 
see.” 

“That is very exactly what I do not do, ma 
petite. No, Andre, do not go—you, too, will wait 
and see. What is this nonsense, Fair?” 

“You needn’t keep it up any longer, I tell you,” 
returned Fair fiercely. “I’ve found out what you 
and Monsieur de Lautrec have been doing. I 
thought that you loved me, Laure—you did it 
pretty well—and all the time you were nothing but 
fortune hunters, were you?” 

“You told Philippe—that?” asked Laure. 
Every atom of colour had drained out of her face, 
but she did not lift her voice. “No, wait, Andre. 
I am not yet through. It would be a good hunter 






150 


PHILIP THE GAY 


who could find your fortune, Fairfax. You have 
none to hunt for.” 

“I have two million dollars,” said Fair. 

“You have not half a million centimes. It was 
all in cotton, that great fortune; it is gone. Your 
lawyers had cabled to you while you were ill in 
Germany, but the doctors they said you must not 
hear that bad news then; they asked me to tell you, 
gently, when you were much better. So I have 
waited, and Philippe, he has cabled three—no, four 
times, to see whether skill and thought and work 
might not save that so mighty fortune. To-day he 
thought perhaps that we might have heard-” 

“ Oh,” said Fair in a small, childish voice. “ Oh.” 
She put her hand to her head; it hurt dreadfully. 

“Well, then, I can go to work-” She made a 

vague gesture, as though if she stretched out her 
hand work would be there for her to cling to— 
and Laure smiled, a fine, cruel little smile. Some¬ 
thing snapped in Fair’s head. “That sounds 
ridiculous, doesn’t it, Laure? But you see, I’m 
not over six feet tall, I’m not stronger than steel 
—I’m not busy twelve hours a day sitting around 
in the sun being an ex-hero—so I’m going to work.” 

I “Did you, perhaps, tell my brother that you 
thought that of him, too?” asked Laure. 

“I told him that, and I told him more,” said 
Fair. 






PHILIP THE GAY 


151 


Laure came toward her, something so terrible 
in her white face that for a moment Fair thought 
that she was going to kill her. 

“Little fool!” she said very softly. “Little, 
wicked, wicked fool, Philippe cannot work— 
Philippe is blind.” 

“No!” cried Fair. She clapped her hands over 
her ears, to shut out those dreadful words, her 
face a twisted mask of terror. “No, no, no!” 

“And I tell you yes, yes, yes,” repeated the tall 
girl before her, closing her long fingers over the small 
wrists, wrenching the clinging hands down relent¬ 
lessly. “Blind like a stone, 1 tell you—blind.” 

“He couldn’t be—he couldn’t be—I’d have 
seen-” 

“What have you ever seen that did not touch 
yourself?” asked Philippe’s sister. “He is blind, 
but not so blind as you. When you came 
to us, never, never did we think that you would 
not see, though we could not talk of it—not yet. 
But Philippe—Philippe he said: ‘No, no—let her 
alone. She has need of peace and mirth and sun¬ 
shine, those doctors said—darkness it must not 
touch her. We will be careful, and perhaps she 
will not know.’ You have well repaid that care, 
have you not, Fairfax?” 

“But his eyes—his eyes- 99 

“His eyes—because they are still there, you 







1 52 


PHILIP THE GAY 


think they see? They saw too much, those eyes; 
they see no more. What made the light behind 
them—that nerve behind them—it is paralyzed. 
You who know so much about the war, you do 
not know that shock could do that? That there 
are men blind because their eyes turned rebel, 
and they would see no more horror—deaf because 
they would not hear more horror—dumb because 
they could not tell their horror. Philippe— 
Philippe he loved beauty—and after a long while 
his eyes they went mad—and he is blind. Work 
—work, you little fool! All day, all night, he 
works, he works. To learn to read—to learn to 
write—to learn to live, to live, you hear-•” 

“Please let me go, Laure,” whispered Fair. 
“Please, Laure—please, Laure.” 

“I will tell Marie Leontine to help you with 
your packing,” said Laure. “And I am glad in¬ 
deed to let you go. Come, Andre.” 

Fair watched them cutting across the garden to 
the east entrance—not the terrace, not the terrace. 
She couldn’t run any more—she felt as though she 
could never run again—but perhaps if she started 
now and went very carefully, holding to the lime 
trees, she could get there before he left. She must, 
she must get there before he left. . . . Not un¬ 

til she was at the steps did she dare to raise her 
eyes. He was still there. 








PHILIP THE GAY 


153 


“Laure?” he called. v “Laure?” 

“It’s Fair,” she said. “I came back.” 

She saw him grind the paper between his hands 
—and then he turned toward her, smiling a little. 

“You had forgotten something?” 

“Yes.” She was quite near now, but her voice 
was so low that it barely reached him. “I came 
back to tell you—to tell you-” 

The smile deepened on the dark young face. 
“Ah, liensl There was something, then, that 
you forgot to tell me? Never should I have said 
it!” 

“Please,” she entreated, in that shadow of a 
voice. “Please. I know now about—about— 
Laure told me!” 

“About why I lie like that cat in the sun? 

Good! Now you tell Laure-” He broke off 

sharply. “She was not kind, our Laure? You 
are weeping? Do not weep; those little jewels of 
tears, so small, so shining, so empty, empty—you 
women love them best of all your jewels, I think. 
But me, I do not think that they become you best!” 

“I don’t cry often,” Fair told him. “Not often, 
really. You can ask Dad—no, no—not Dad. 
It’s because I’m tired, probably. I came back be¬ 
cause I wanted to tell you-” She swallowed 

despairingly, the tears salt on her lips. 

“Why, because you were a good child,” he 






154 


PHILIP THE GAY 


helped her gaily. “And wanted to tell me that 
you were sorry.” 

“No—no. Because I wanted to tell you that I 
was glad.” 

“6r/adF” He was on his feet, with that cry. 

“How could I be sorry for you, Philippe? Oh, I 
can’t be sorry for myself—not even now—not 
now, when I see myself. I wanted so to be 
proud of you—you don’t know—you don’t—you 
don’t-” 

“And why did you so want to be proud of me, 
may I ask?” 

“Because I love you,” said Fair clearly. 

Philippe le Gai caught at the cushioned chair. 
“You are mad,” he said. 

“Yes.” The voice tripped in its haste. “Yes, 
but you see I had to tell you. You mustn’t mind; 
I’m going this afternoon—Marie Leontine’s wait¬ 
ing now. Don’t mind, please, Philippe; I didn’t 
know, myself, truly—not till Laure told me about 
—about you, and I knew that I didn’t care at all 
how horrible and vile I had been, because I was so 
glad that you—that you-” 

“Hush!” He stood quite still, and then he 
raised his hand to his eyes. “ I should send you far 
from me, Fairfax.” 

“Yes,” said Fair, “I’m not any good, you see. 
All I had to give you was my money and my—my 







PHILIP THE GAY 155 

prettiness. I can’t give you either of them, 
Philippe.” 

“When I heard you laugh, that first night when 
you came,” he told her, “I remembered—I re¬ 
membered that laughter was not just a sound to 
cover up despair—I remembered how to laugh that 
night.” 

She stared at him, voiceless. 

“When you spoke to me—when you spoke to 
me, my Music—I was glad then that I could not 
see, because I wished to listen only, always.” 

“Philippe,” she prayed. “Don’t, don’t send me 
away, Philippe.” 

“We are mad,” he said. “Come closer.” 

And once more she went toward him across that 
sunlit space, to where he stood, tall and splendid 
and terrible. “ Closer still,” he said. “Closer still— 
still closer. Why do you weep, my Laughter?” 

“Hold me—hold me—don’t let me go.” 

“Blindness,” he said. “It is just a little word, 
a little, dark, ugly word to frighten foolish children. 
Are you beautiful, my Loveliness? Never, never 
could you be beautiful as I dream you!” He 
touched her lips with his brown fingers. 

“Smile!” he said. And she smiled. 

“What is blindness to me who can touch your 
lips to laughter?” he asked her, bending his black 
head until his lips swept her lashes. “What is 





156 PHILIP THE GAY 

blindness to me, who can touch your eyes to 
tears?” 

The sunlight fell across the bright hair of the 
last of the fighting Carters—he could feel it warm 
against his lips and suddenly he laughed aloud. 

“What is blindness to me?” cried Philippe le 
Gai to the golden sun. “ What is blindness to me, 
who hold my light against my heart?” 


GREEN GARDENS 


D APHNE was singing to herself when she 
came through the painted gate in the back 
wall. She was singing partly because it 
was June, and Devon, and she was seventeen, and 
partly because she had caught a breath-taking 
glimpse of herself in the long mirror as she had 
flashed through the hall at home, and it seemed 
almost too good to be true that the radiant small 
person in the green muslin frock with the wreath 
of golden hair bound about her head and the sea- 
blue eyes laughing back at her was really Miss 
Daphne Chiltern. Incredible, incredible luck to 
look like that, half Dryad, half Kate Greenaway— 
she danced down the turf path to the herb garden, 
swinging her great wicker basket and singing like 
a mad thing. 

“He promised to buy me a bonnie blue ribbon,” 
carolled Daphne, all her ribbons flying. 




He promised to buy me a bonnie blue ribbon. 
He promised to buy me a bonnie blue ribbon 
To tie up-” 


157 



158 


GREEN GARDENS 


The song stopped as abruptly as though some¬ 
one had struck it from her lips. A strange man 
was kneeling by the beehive in the herb garden. 
He was looking at her over his shoulder, at once 
startled and amused, and she saw that he was wear¬ 
ing a rather shabby tweed suit and that his face 
was brown against his close-cropped tawny hair. 
He smiled, his teeth a strong flash of white. 

“Hello!” he greeted her, in a tone at once casual 
and friendly. 

Daphne returned the smile uncertainly. “Hello,” 
she replied gravely. 

The strange man rose easily to his feet, and she 
saw that he was very tall and carried his head 
rather splendidly, like the young bronze Greek in 
Uncle Roland’s study at home. But his eyes—his 
eyes were strange—quite dark and burned out. The 
rest of him looked young and vivid and adventur¬ 
ous, but his eyes looked as though the adventure 
were over, though they were still questing. 

“Were you looking for any one?” she asked, 
and the man shook his head, laughing. 

“No one in particular, unless it was you.” 

Daphne’s soft brow darkened. “It couldn’t 
possibly have been me,” she said in a stately 
small voice, “because, you see, I don’t know you. 
Perhaps you didn’t know that there is no one living 
in Green Gardens now?” 



GREEN GARDENS 159 

“Oh, yes, I knew. The Fanes have left for 
Ceylon, haven’t they?” 

“Sir Harry left two weeks ago, because he had to 
see the old governor before he sailed, but Lady 
Audrey only left last week. She had to close the 
London house, too, so there was a great deal to do.” 

“I see. And so Green Gardens is deserted?” 

“It is sold,” said Daphne, with a small quaver in 
her voice, “just this afternoon. I came over to 
say good-bye to it, and to get some mint and 
lavender from the garden.” 

“Sold?” repeated the man, and there was an 
agony of incredulity in the stunned whisper. He 
flung out his arm against the sun-warmed bricks of 
the high wall as though to hold off some invader. 
“No, no; they’d never dare to sell it.” 

“I’m glad you mind so much,” said Daphne. 
“It’s strange that nobody minds but us, isn’t it? 
I cried at first—and then I thought that it would 
be happier if it wasn’t lonely and empty, poor dear 
—and then, it was such a beautiful day, that I for¬ 
got to be unhappy.” 

The man bestowed a wrenched smile on her. 
“You hardly conveyed the impression of unre¬ 
lieved gloom as you came around that comer,” 
he assured her. 

“I—I haven’t a very good memory for being un¬ 
happy,” Daphne confessed remorsefully, a guilty 



160 


GREEN GARDENS 


rose staining her to her brow at the memory of 
that exultant chant. 

He threw back his head with a sudden shout of 
laughter. 

“ These are glad tidings! I’d rather find a pagan 
than a Puritan at Green Gardens any day. Let’s 
both have a poor memory. Do you mind if I 
smoke?” 

“No,” she replied, “but do you mind if I ask you 
what you are doing here? ” 

“Not a bit.” He lit the stubby brown pipe, 
curving his hand dexterously to shelter it from the 
little breeze. He had the most beautiful hands 
that she had ever seen, slim and brown and fine; 
they looked as though they would be miraculously 
strong—and miraculously gentle. “I came to see 
whether there was ‘honey still for tea,’ Mis tress 
Dryad!” 

“Honey—for tea?” she echoed wonderingly. 
“Was that why you were looking at the hive?” 

He puffed meditative!}'. “Well—partly. It’s a ■ 
quotation from a poem. Ever read Rupert 
Brooke?” 

“Oh, yes, yes.” Her voice tripped in its eager¬ 
ness. “I know one by heart— 

“ ‘If I should die think only this of me: 

That there’s some corner of a foreign field 
That is for ever England. That shall be- 


»» 



GREEN GARDENS 


161 


He cut in on the magical little voice roughly. 

“Ah, what damned nonsense! Do you suppose 
he’s happy, in his foreign field, that golden lover? 
Why shouldn’t even the dead be homesick? No, 
no—he was sick for home in Germany when he 
wrote that poem of mine—he’s sicker for it in 
Heaven, I’ll warrant.” He pulled himself up 
swiftly at the look of amazement in Daphne’s eyes. 
“I’ve clean forgotten my manners,” he confessed 
ruefully. “No, don’t get that flying look in your 
eyes; I swear that I’ll be good. It’s a long time— 
it’s a long time since I’ve talked to any one who 
needed gentleness. If you knew what need I had 
of it, you’d stay a little while, I think.” 

“Of course I’ll stay,” she said. “I’d love to, 
if you want me to.” 

“I want you to more than I’ve ever wanted 
anything that I can remember.” His tone was so 
matter-of-fact that Daphne thought that she must 
have imagined the words. “Now, can’t we make 
ourselves comfortable for a little while? I’d feel 
safer if you weren’t standing there ready for instant 
flight! Here’s a nice bit of grass—and the wall for 
a back-” 

Daphne glanced anxiously at the green muslin 
frock. “It’s—it’s pretty hard to be comfortable 
without cushions,” she submitted diffidently. 

The man yielded again to laughter. “Are even 






162 


GREEN GARDENS 


Dryads afraid to spoil their frocks? Cushions it 
shall be. There are some extra ones in the chest 
in the East Indian room, aren’t there?” 

Daphne let the basket slip through her fingers, 
her eyes black through sheer surprise. 

“But how did you know—how did you know 
about the lacquer chest?” she whispered breath¬ 
lessly. 

“Oh, devil take me for a blundering ass!” He 
stood considering her forlornly for a moment, and 
then shrugged his shoulders, with the brilliant and 
disarming smile. “The game’s up, thanks to my 
inspired lunacy! But I’m going to trust you not 
to say that you’ve seen me. I know about the 
lacquer chest because I always kept my marbles 
there.” 

“Are you Stephen Fane?” 

At the awed whisper the man bowed low, all 
mocking grace, his hand on his heart, the sun 
burnishing his tawny head. 

“Oh-h!” breathed Daphne. She bent to pick 
up the wicker basket, her small face white and 
hard. 

“Wait!” said Stephen Fane. His face was 
white and hard, too. “You are right to go—en¬ 
tirely, absolutely right—but I am going to beg you 
to stay. I don’t know what you’ve heard about 
me; however vile it is, it’s less than the truth-” 



GREEN GARDENS 


163 


“I have heard nothing of you,” said Daphne, 
holding her gold-wreathed head high, “but five 
years ago I was not allowed to come to Green 
Gardens for weeks because I mentioned your name. 
I was told that it was not a name to pass decent 
lips.” 

Something terrible leaped in those burned-out 
eyes, and died. 

.“I had not thought they would use their hate to 
lash a child,” he said. “They were quite right— 
and you, too. Good-night.” 

“Good-night,” replied Daphne clearly. She 
started down the path, but at its bend she turned 
to look back—because she was seventeen, and it 
was June, and she remembered his laughter. He 
was standing quite still by the golden straw bee¬ 
hive, but he had thrown one arm across his eyes, 
as though to shut out some intolerable sight. And 
then, with a soft little rush, she was standing beside 
him. 

“How—how do we get the cushions?” she de¬ 
manded breathlessly. 

Stephen Fane dropped his arm, and Daphne 
drew back a little at the sudden blaze of wonder in 
his face. 

“Oh,” he whispered voicelessly. “Oh, you 
Loveliness!” He took a step toward her, and 
then stood still, clinching his brown hands. Then 


164 


GREEN GARDENS 


he thrust them deep in his pockets, standing very 
straight. “I do think,” he said carefully, “I do 
think you had better go. The fact that 1 have 
tried to make you stay simply proves the particular 
type of rotter that I am. Good-bye—I’ll never for¬ 
get that you came back.” 

“I am not going,” said Daphne sternly. “ Not if 
you beg me. Because you need me. And no mat¬ 
ter how many wicked things you have done, there 
can’t be anything as wicked as going away when 
someone needs you. How do we get the cushions? ” 

“Oh, my wise Dryad!” His voice broke on 
laughter, but Daphne saw that his lashes were 
suddenly bright with tears. “Stay, then—why, 
even I cannot harm you. God himself can’t grudge 
me this little space of wonder: He knows how far 
I’ve come for it—how I’ve fought and struggled 
and ached to win it—how in dirty lands and dirty 
places I’ve dreamed of summer twilight in a still 
garden—and England!” 

“Didn’t you dream of me?” asked Daphne wist¬ 
fully, with a little catch of reproach. 

He laughed again unsteadily. “Why, who 
could ever dream of you, my Wonder? You are a 
thousand thousand dreams come true.” 

Daphne bestowed on him a tremulous and 
radiant smile. “Please let us get the cushions. 
I think I am a little tired.” 


GREEN GARDENS 


165 


“And I am a graceless fool! There used to be a 
pane of glass cut out in one of the south casement 
windows. Shall we try that?” 

“Please, yes. How did you find it, Stephen?” 
She saw again that thrill of wonder on his face, but 
his voice was quite steady. 

“I didn’t find it; I did it! It was uncommonly 
useful, getting in that way sometimes, I can tell 
you. And, by the Lord Harry, here it is. Wait a 
minute. Loveliness; I’ll get through and open the 
south door for you—no chance that way of spoiling 
the frock.” He swung himself up with the sure 
grace of a cat, smiled at her—vanished—it was 
hardly a minute later that she heard the bolts drag¬ 
ging back in the south door, and he flung it wide. 

The sunlight streamed in through the deep hall 
and stretched hesitant fingers into the dusty quiet 
of the great East Indian room, gilding the soft tones 
of the faded chintz, touching very gently the pol¬ 
ished furniture and the dim prints on the walls. He 
swung across the threshold without a word. 
Daphne tiptoeing behind him. 

“How still it is,” he said in a hushed voice. 
“How sweet it smells!” 

“It’s the potpourri in the Canton jars,” she told 
him shyly. “I always made it every summer for 
Lady Audrey; she thought I did it better than any 
one else. I think so, too.” She flushed at the 


166 GREEN GARDENS 

I 

mirth in his eyes, but held her ground sturdily. 
“Flowers are sweeter for you if you love them— 
even dead ones,” she explained bravely. 

“They would be dead, indeed, if they were not 
sweet for you.” Her cheeks burned bright at the 
low intensity of his voice, but he turned suddenly 
away. “Oh, there she sails—there she sails still, 
my beauty. Isn’t she the proud one, though— 
straight into the wind!” He hung over the little 
ship model, thrilled as any child. “ The Flying 
Lady; see where it’s painted on her? Grand¬ 
father gave it to me when I was seven—he had 
it from his father when he was six. Lord, how 
proud I was!” He stood back to see it better, 
frowning a little. “One of those ropes is wrong; 
any fool could tell that.” His hands hovered 
over it for a moment—dropped. “No matter— 
the new owners are probably not seafarers! The 
lacquer chest is at the far end, isn’t it? Yes, here. 
Are three enough—four? We’re off!” But still 
he lingered, sweeping the great room with his dark 
eyes. “It’s full of all kinds of junk; they never 
liked it—no period, you see. I had the run of it— 
I loved it as though it were alive; it was alive for 
me. From Elizabeth’s day down, all the family 
adventurers brought their treasures here—beaten 
gold and hammered silver, mother-of-pearl and 
peacock feathers, strange woods and stranger 



GREEN GARDENS 


167 


spices, porcelains and embroideries and blown 
glass. There was always an adventurer some¬ 
where in each generation—and however far he 
wandered, he came back to Green Gardens to bring 
his treasures home. When I was a yellow-headed 
imp of Satan, hiding my marbles in the lacquer 
chest, I used to swear that when I grew up I would 
bring home the finest treasure of all, if I had to 
search the world from end to end. And now the 
last adventurer has come home to Green Gardens 
—and he has searched the world from end to end— 
and he is empty-handed.” 

“No, no,” whispered Daphne. “He has brought 
home the greatest treasure of all, that adventurer. 
He has brought home the beaten gold of his love 
and the hammered silver of his dreams—and he 
has brought them from very far.” 

“He had brought greater treasures than those 
to you, lucky room,” said the last of the adven¬ 
turers. “You can never be sad again; you will 
always be gay and proud—because for just one 
moment he brought you the gold of her hair and 
the silver of her voice.” 

“He is talking great nonsense, room,” said a 
very small voice, “but it is beautiful nonsense, and 
I am a wicked girl, and I hope that he will talk 
some more. And please, I think we will go into 
the garden and see.” 


GREEN GARDENS 


168 

) 

All the way back down the flagged path to the 
herb garden they were quiet; even after he had 
arranged the cushions against the rose-red wall, 
even after he had stretched out at full length beside 
her and lighted another pipe. 

After a while he said, staring at the straw hive; 
“There used to be a jolly little fat brown one that 
was a great pal of mine. How long do bees live?” 

‘I don’t know,” she answered vaguely, and after 
a long pause, full of quiet, pleasant odours from 
the herb garden, and the happy noises of small 
things tucking themselves away for the night, and 
the faint drift of tobacco smoke, she asked; “What 
was it about ‘honey still for tea’?” 

“Oh, that!” lie raised himself on one elbow 
so that he could see her better. “It was a poem 
I came across while I was in East Africa; someone 
sent a copy of Rupert Brooke’s things to a chap out 
there, and this one fastened itself around me like a 
vise. It starts where he’s sitting in a cafe in Berlin 
with a lot of German Jews around him, swallowing 
down their beer; and suddenly he remembers. All 
the lost, unforgettable beauty comes back to him 
in that dirty place; it gets him by the throat. It 
got me, too. 

“‘Ah, God! to see the branches stir 
Across the moon at Grantchester! 

To smell the thrilling-sweet and rotten 


GREEN GARDENS 


169 


Unforgettable, unforgotten 
River-smell, and hear the breeze 
Sobbing in the little trees. . . . 

Oh, is the water sweet and cool. 

Gentle and brown, above the pool? 

And laughs the immortal river still 
Under the mill, under the mill? 

Say, is there Beauty yet to find? 

And Certainty? and Quiet kind? 

Deep meadows yet, for to forget 

The lies, and truths, and pain? . . . oh, yet 

Stands the Church clock at ten to three? 

And is there honey still for tea?’” 

“That’s beautiful,” she said, “but it hurts.” 

“Thank God you’ll never know how it hurts, 
little Golden Heart in quiet gardens. But for 
some of us, caught like rats in the trap of the ugly 
fever we called living, it was black torture, and yet 
our dear delight to remember the deep meadows 
we had lost—to wonder if there was honey still for 
tea.” 

“Stephen, won’t you tell me about it—won’t 
that help?” 

And suddenly someone else looked at her 
through those haunted eyes—a little boy, terrified 
and forsaken. “Oh, I have no right to soil you 
with it. But I came back to tell someone about 
it; I had to. I had to wait until Father and Audrey 
went away. I knew they’d hate to see me—she 
was my step-mother, you know, and she always 


170 


GREEN GARDENS 


loathed me, and he never cared. In East Africa I 
used to stay awake at night thinking that I might 
die, and that no one in England would ever care; 
no one would know how I had loved her. It was 
worse than dying to think that.” 

“But why couldn’t you come back to Green 
Gardens—why couldn’t you make them see, 
Stephen?” 

“ Why, what was there to see? When they sent 
me down from Cambridge for that dirty little af¬ 
fair, I was only nineteen—and they told me I had 
disgraced my name and Green Gardens and my 
country—and I went mad with pride and shame, 
and swore I’d drag their precious name through 
the dirt of every country in the world. And I did 
—and I did.” 

His head was buried in his arms, but Daphne 
heard. It seemed strange indeed to her that she 
felt no shrinking and no terror; only great pity for 
what he had lost, great grief for what he might 
have had. For a minute she forgot that she was 
Daphne, the heedless and gay-hearted, and that 
he was a broken and an evil man. For a minute 
he was a little lad, and she was his lost mother. 

“Don’t mind, Stephen,” she whispered to him, 
“don’t mind. Now you have come home; now it 
is all done with, that ugliness. Please, please 
don’t mind.” 


GREEN GARDENS 


171 


“No, no,” said the stricken voice, “you don’t 
know, you don’t know, thank God. But I swear 
I’ve paid—I swear I have. When the others 
used to take their dirty drugs to make them for¬ 
get, they’d dream of strange paradises, unknown 
heavens; but through the haze and mist that they 
brought, I would remember—I would remember. 
The filth and the vileness would fade and dissolve 
—and I would see the sun-dial, with the roses 
on it, warm in the sun, and smell the clove 
pinks in the kitchen border, and touch the 
cresses by the brook, cool and green and wet. All 
the sullen drums and whining flutes would sink to 
silence, and I would hear the little yellow-headed 
cousin of the vicar singing in the twilight, singing. 
‘Weep you no more, sad fountains’ and ‘Hark, 
hark, the lark. ’ And the painted yellow faces and 
the little wicked hands and perfumed fans would 
vanish and I would see again the gay beauty of the 
lady who hung above the mantel in the long 
drawing room, the lady who laughed across the 
centuries in her white muslin frock, with eyes that 
matched the blue ribbon in her wind-blown curls— 
the lady who was as young and lovely as England, 
for all the years! Oh, I would remember, I would 
remember! It was twilight, and I was hurrying 
home through the dusk after tennis at the rectory; 
there was a bell ringing quietly somewhere, and 



172 GREEN GARDENS 

a moth flying by brushed against my face with 
velvet—and I could smell the hawthorn hedge 
glimmering white, and see the first star swinging 
low above the trees, and lower still, and brighter 
still, the lights of home. . . . And then before 

my very eyes they would fade, they would fade, 
dimmer and dimmer—they would flicker and go 
out, and I would be back again, w 7 ith tawdriness 
and shame and vileness fast about me; and I 
would pay.” 

“But now you have paid enough,” Daphne told 
him. “Oh, surely, surely, you have paid enough. 
Now you have come home—now you can forget.” 

“No,” said Stephen Fane. “Now I must go.” 

“Go?” At the startled echo he raised his head. 

“What else?” he asked. “Did you think that 
I would stay?” 

“But I do not want you to go.” Her lips were 
white, but she spoke very clearly. 

Stephen Fane never moved, but his eyes, dark 
and wondering, rested on her like a caress. 

“Oh, my little Loveliness, what dream is this?” 

“You must not go away again; you must not.” 

“I am baser than I thought,” he said, very low. 
“I have made you pity me, I who forfeited your 
lovely pity this long time. It cannot even touch 
me now. I have sat here like a dark Othello telling 
tales to a small white Desdemona, and you, God 



GREEN GARDENS 


173 


help me, have thought me tragic and abused. You 
shall not think that. In a few minutes I will be 
gone; I’ll not have you waste a dream on me. 
Listen; there is nothing vile that I’ve not done— 
nothing, do you hear? Not clean sin, like murder; 
I’ve cheated at cards, and played with loaded dice, 
and stolen the rings off the fingers of an Argentine 

Jewess who-” His voice twisted and broke 

before the lovely mercy in the frightened eyes that 
still met his so bravely. 

“Why, Stephen?” 

“So that I could buy my dreams. So that I 
could purchase peace with little dabs of brown in 
a pipe-bowl, little puffs of white in the palm of my 
hand, little drops of liquid on a ball of cotton. So 
that I could drug myself with dirt—and forget the 
dirt and remember England.” 

He rose to his feet with that swift gra^e of his, 
and Daphne rose, too, slowly. 

“I am going now; will you walk to the gate with 
me?” 

He matched his long step to hers, watching the 
troubled wonder on her face intently. 

“How old are you, my Dryad?” 

“I am seventeen.” 

“Seventeen! Oh, God be good to us, I had for¬ 
gotten that one could be seventeen. What’s 
that?” 




174 


GREEN GARDENS 


He paused, suddenly alert, listening to a distant 
whistle, sweet on the summer air. 

“Oh, that—that is Robin.” 

“Ah-” His smile flashed, tender and ironic. 

“And who is Robin?” 

“He is—just Robin. He is down from Cam¬ 
bridge for a week, and I told him that he might 
walk home with me.” 

“Then I must be off quickly. Is he coming to 
this gate?” 

“No, to the south one.” 

“Listen to me, my Dryad—are you listening?” 
For her face was turned away. 

“Yes,” said Daphne. 

“You are going to forget me, to forget this after¬ 
noon, to forget everything but Robin whistling 
through the summer twilight.” 

“No,” said Daphne. 

“Yes; because you have a very poor memory 
about unhappy things! You told me so. But 
just for a minute after I have gone you will 
remember that now all is very well with me, be¬ 
cause I have found the deep meadows—and honey 
still for tea—and you. You are to remember 
that for just one minute, will you? And now 
good-bye-” 

She tried to say the words, but she could not. 
For a moment he stood staring down at the 





GREEN GARDENS 


175 


white pathos of the small face, and then he turned 
away. But when he came to the gate, he paused 
and put his arms about the wall, as though he 
would never let it go, laying his cheek against the 
sun-warmed bricks, his eyes fast closed. The 
whistling came nearer, and he stirred, put his 
hand on the little painted gate, vaulted across 
it lightly, and was gone. She turned at Robin’s 
quick step on the walk. 

“Ready, dear? What are you staring at?” 

“Nothing. Robin, did you ever hear of Stephen 
Fane?” 

He nodded grimly. 

“ Do you know—do you know what he is doing 
now?” 

“Doing now?” He stared at her blankly. 
“What on earth do you mean? He’s been dead 
for months; killed in the campaign in East Africa— 
only decent thing he ever did in his life. Why?” 

Daphne never stirred. She stood quite still, 
staring at the painted gate. Then she said, very 
carefully: “Someone thought—someone thought 
that they had seen him—quite lately.” 

Robin laughed comfortingly. “No use looking 
so scared about it, my blessed child. Perhaps 
they did. The War Office made all kinds of 
ghastly blunders; it was a quick step from ‘missing 
in action’ to ‘killed.’ And he probably would 


176 


GREEN GARDENS 


have been jolly glad of a chance to drop out quietly 
and have everyone think he was done for/’ 

Daphne never took her eyes from the gate. 
“Yes,” she said quietly, “I suppose he would. 
Will you get my basket, Robin? I left it by the 
beehive. There are some cushions that belong 
in the East Indian room, too. The south door is 
open.” 

When he had gone, she stood shaking for a 
moment, listening to his footsteps die away, and 
then she flew to the gate, searching the twilight 
desperately with straining eyes. There was no 
one there—no one at all—but then the turn in the 
lane would have hidden him by now. And sud¬ 
denly terror fell from her like a cloak. 

She turned swiftly to the brick wall, straining 
up, up on tiptoes, to lay her cheek against its 
roughened surface, to touch it very gently with her 
lips. She could hear Robin whistling down the 
path, but she did not turn. She was bidding fare¬ 
well to Green Gardens—and the last adventurer. 



DELILAH 


B UT wliat is she like?” asked O’Hara im¬ 
patiently. “Man alive, you’ve seen her, 
haven’t you? Sat next to her at dinner at 
the Embassy last night, didn’t you? Well, then, 
for the love of the Saints, what’s the creature like? ” 
De Nemours shrugged his shoulders, raising 
whimsical eyebrows at the slim young giant tower¬ 
ing above him. 

“Mon cher , one cannot put the lady into two 
words. Voyons—she is, as our Alfred so charm¬ 
ingly puts it, blonde like the wheat-” 

“Oh, rot.” The ardent voice of the British rep¬ 
resentative was curt to the point of rudeness, and 
De Nemour’s smile became exquisitely courteous. 
“I don’t care whether she’s an albino. She’s the 
American representative on this committee, and 
I’m interested in her mental qualifications. Is she 
intelligent?” 

“Intelligent! Ah, my poor friend, she is far, 
far worse.” His smile grew reminiscent as he lit 
his cigarette. “She has a wit like a shining sword, 
and eyelashes of a truly fantastic length.” 

177 



178 


DELILAH 


“ And every time her eyes shine you think it’s the 
sword,” commented O’Hara bitterly. “God, this 
is hideous! I can see her sitting there chattering 
epigrams and fluttering dimples-” 

“You do Mrs. Lindsay an injustice,” said an¬ 
other voice quietly, and O’Hara swung around with 
a slight start. 

“Oh, Celati, I clean forgot that you were 
there. I thought that you had never met the 
lady.” 

“Unfortunately for me, you are entirely correct. 
But last night I came in after the dinner for some 
bridge, and I watched Mrs. Lindsay with great 
interest, with great admiration, for more than half 
an hour. There was a most fat Senator from the 
South talking to her, and she was listening. I say 
listening , mark. In this great country the most 
charming of women feel that they have already ac¬ 
quired all desirable information and wisdom and 
that it is their not unpainful function to dissemi¬ 
nate it. I find that it makes intercourse more ex¬ 
citing than flattering. But Mrs. Lindsay was— 
listening.” 

“You mean to say that she said nothing at all 
in half an hour?” O’Hara’s tone was flatly in¬ 
credulous. 

“Oh, si , si, she spoke three times—and if one 
may judge by the human countenance, I dare to 




DELILAH 


179 


wager that that most fat Senator thought that 
never woman spoke more wittily or wisely.” 

“And we are to have the jewels?” 

“But surely. She said after the first ten min¬ 
utes, ‘Oh, but do go on!’ and after the next, ‘But 
what happened then?’ and after the third ‘Good¬ 
night—and thank you/ May I have a light, De 
Nemours? Thanks!” 

“And those—those are the epigrams?” O’Hara 
threw back his head and laughed—a sudden boy¬ 
ish shout, oddly at variance with his stern young 
face. 

“Ah,” murmured Celati, a reminiscent and enig¬ 
matic smile touching his lips, “you should have 
heard her voice!” 

O’Hara’s smile vanished abruptly. He came 
perilously near scowling as he stood staring down 
at the inscrutable Latin countenances blandly pre¬ 
sented for inspection. De Nemours permitted a 
flicker of genial appreciation to warm his cold 
eyes, the tribute of a highly distinguished con¬ 
noisseur. Truly, this young Irishman, he was of a 
magnificence. No collector of beauty in all its 
forms could remain unmoved by the sight of that 
superb head—that more than superb body. 
Praxiteles Hermes turned gypsy! One of those 
Celts with obviously Spanish blood running hot 
and cold through their veins. The cool appraisal 



180 


DELILAH 


hovered for the moment on the verge of interest— 
flickered out. De Nemours was quite definitely 
convinced that not one man in a thousand was 
deserving of interest, and he had found little in 
an extremely varied experience to shake his con¬ 
clusions. 

“An exquisite voice,” he agreed pleasantly. 
“It will turn our dullest statistics to madrigals. 
The gods are merciful.” 

O’Hara swung his chair to the table, protest 
bitter in his stormy gray eyes and on his quick 
tongue. These damned foreigners! 

“You don’t seem to grasp the situation. We 
are here to settle matters of vital urgency, not to 
conduct a salon. Our reports on the various in¬ 
surgent activities throughout our countries are to 
be test cases for the world. We’re not only to re¬ 
port conditions but to suggest solutions. Think, 
man, think! This room may be the laboratory 
where we will discover the formula to heal a world 
that’s near to dying. Can you turn that into an 
epigram or a jest?” 

“No,” said De Nemours softly, and he looked 
suddenly very tired and very old, “that is no 
epigram, Monsieur O’Hara—that is no jest. Ah, 
my country, my country.” His voice was hardly 
above a whisper, but in the cold and bitter eyes 
there was something that wailed aloud. 


DELILAH 


181 


“Yes, my country,” O’Hara retorted fiercely, 
“but more than that. There are five members of 
this Committee—not four. ” 

“Not four?” Celati’s level voice was suddenly 
sharp. 

“Not four. There will be represented at this 
table Great Britain, France, Italy, the United 
States—and Humanity. The greatest of these, 
gentlemen, will have no voice.” 

“Au bonheur / ” commented De Nemours affably. 
“It, unlike Mrs. Lindsay, might not sing us 
madrigals.” 

O’Hara brought his clenched fist down on the 
table with a gesture at once despairing and menac¬ 
ing. “Now by the Lord,” he said, his voice oddly 
shaken, “if this woman-” 

The door into the hall opened very quietly, 
closed more quietly still, and Delilah Lindsay stood 
facing them, her hand still on the knob. 

“I knocked twice,” she said softly. “The wood¬ 
work must be very thick.” 

O’Hara rose slowly to his feet. Celati and De 
Nemours had already found theirs. 

“Good evening,” he said, “it’s not quite the 
hour, I believe.” He was fighting an absurd and 
overwhelming impulse—an impulse to reply with 
perfect candour, “The woodwork is not thick at 
all. Were you listening at that door?” 




182 


DELILAH 


For a moment, hardly longer, Delilah stood quite 
still. It was long enough to stamp on every mind 
present an indelible picture of the primrose-yellow 
head shining out against the dark panels; there¬ 
fore, long enough for all practical purposes. She 
released the door-knob, smiling very faintly. 

“It is unfortunate for a man to be late,” she 
replied, “but unpardonable for a woman. We 
have so much time of our own to waste that we 
must be very careful not to waste that of others. 
Bon soir , De Nemours.” 

She crossed the room with her light, unhurried 
tread, and stopped, serenely gracious, before 
O’Hara. 

“You are the British representative, are you not? 
It is very stupid of me, but I don’t believe that I 
have heard your name.” 

“You have heard it a good hundred times,” 
thought the British representative grimly. 

“Madame, permit that I present to you Mr. 
O’Hara.” 

“Mr. O’Hara?” Her smile was suddenly as 
winning!^ mischievous as a child’s. “That’s a 
grand name entirely for an Englishman.” 

O’Hara’s eyes were ice gray. “I’m no English¬ 
man, Mrs. Lindsay. But some of us in Ireland 
hold still that we are part of Great Britain though 
the Colonials may have seen fit to forget it.” 


DELILAH 


183 


The velvety eyes lifted to his were warm with 
sympathy and concern. “That’s splendid of you; 
we hear so much bitterness amongst the Irish here, 
and somehow it seems—ugly. After all, as you 
say, no matter what she may do—or has done— 
England is England! But I am distressed to hear 
that there has been disloyalty elsewhere. You 
think Canada—Australia?” 

“I think neither. It was of other children of 
England that I was thinking, Mrs. Lindsay— 
ungrateful and rebellious children.” 

“Oh, how stupid. Egypt, of course, and India. 
But, after all, they are only adopted children, 
aren’t they? Perhaps if we give them time they’ll 
grow to be as loyal and steadfast and dependable as 
you yourselves. Pazienza -” 

“I was not-” 

She raised a protesting hand, gay and imperious. 
“No, no, don’t even bother to deny it. You must 
be discreet, I know—indeed, indeed I honour you 
for it.” She turned to De Nemours, the sparkling 
face suddenly grave. “But we must not be for¬ 
getting; we are here to discuss more vital matters 
than England’s colonial policy, vital as that may 
well be. Will you forgive us—and present my 
colleague from Italy?” 

“Mrs. Lindsay, Signor Celati.” Both De Ne¬ 
mours and Celati were struggling with counte- 






184 


DELILAH 


nances not habitually slaves to mirth, but the look 
of stony and incredulous amazement on O’Hara’s 
expressive visage was enough to undermine the 
Sphinx. 

By what miracle of dexterity had she turned the 
tables on him, leaving him gracefully rebuked for 
triviality—he, the prophet and crusader? And by 
what magic had she transformed his very palpable 
hit at the recalcitrant Americans into a boomer¬ 
ang? He drew a long breath. This woman—this 
woman was so unscrupulously clever that she could 
afford to seem stupid. That rendered her pretty 
nearly invulnerable. The stormy eyes grew still— 
narrowed intently—smiled. 

“Mrs. Lindsay is entirely right,” he agreed. 
“Let us get to business; Heaven knows that we 
have enough of it to get through! Mrs. Lindsay, 
we have gone over a certain amount of ground in 
your unavoidable absence. I regret-” 

“I, too, regret it,” she said quietly. “But it is, 
as you say, unavoidable. I was greatly honoured 
by the Government’s choice, but it was impossible 
for me to drop the Oregon investigations at that 
stage. If I could have the minutes of the previous 
meetings-” 

“We have no minutes. It has been decided to 
dispense with the services of a stenographer, as 
the matters handled are of really incalculable deli- 





DELILAH 


185 


cacy. Each of us, however, keeps an abstract of 
the proceedings, which we check up together, in 
order to prevent any possible misunderstandings. 
These are at your disposal, naturally.” 

“I see. Then if it will not be too much trouble. 
I’ll run through yours. It will only be necessary 
to see one lot, if they have been checked, of course. 
Shall we begin where you left off, then? And shall 
I take this chair? I’m quite ready. I left my hat 
and cloak and such feminine trappings down¬ 
stairs. What is under discussion?” 

“I’ll have the report for you at the next meet¬ 
ing,” said O’Hara. “We were thrashing out the 
situation in Rome. You think that the Pope will 
influence the Blacks to vote against the commonist 
element, Celati? That’s unusual, isn’t it? A 
distinct return to temporal power?” 

“Unusual, yes. A return to temporal power? 

i 

Possibly. But the Vatican contends that it is a 
spiritual and social matter rather than a political 

matter. It seems-” 

For a moment—for more than a moment O’Hara 
lost track of the even, unemotional voice. He was 
watching, with a blazing and concentrated curios¬ 
ity, the face of the American representative. Mrs. 
Lindsay was listening to the Italian with rapt in¬ 
terest, but O’Hara could have sworn that it was 
the same interest, fascinated and indulgent, which 



186 


DELILAH 


an intelligent small child bestows on a grown-up 
telling fairy tales—an interest which whispers 
"It’s so pretty—let’s pretend it’s true!” She 
looked almost like a small child as she sat facing 
him across the darkly shining table; almost like a 
small boy. Her thick, soft hair was cut short and 
framed her face like a little mediaeval page’s— 
straight across the low white forehead, curling 
strongly under about her ears. The blue jacket 
with its white Eton collar and narrow cuffs was 
boyish, too. And the chin—O’Hara pulled him¬ 
self up, frowning. He was mad! His cousin 
Norah was boyish, if you like, with her honest 
freckled face and puppy eyes, and red hands—but 
this small smooth creature could clip her shining 
hair to its roots—it would only betray the eternal 
feminine more damningly. No stiff collar would 
ever do anything but accentuate the velvety dark¬ 
ness of her eyes, the pure beauty of the wistful 
mouth. Possibly that was why she wore it! He 
caught back a grim smile as the velvet eyes met 
his. 

“It’s desperately awkward, of course,” said the 
voice that De Nemours had accurately described 
as exquisite. “What solution would you suggest, 
Mr. O’Hara?” 

“I am not yet prepared to offer a solution,” 
Mr. O’Hara informed her a trifle stiffly. What in 



DELILAH 187 

the name of Gods and Devils had Celati been 
talking about, anyway? 

“But after all,” urged Mrs. Lindsay, “it comes 
down to a question of two alternatives, doesn’t it? 
Which seems to you the lesser evil?” 

“I prefer to wait until we hear a little more about 
it.” His back was against the wall, but he thor¬ 
oughly intended to die fighting. 

“ More about it? What more is there to hear? ” 
Her amazement was so wide-eyed that it seemed 
almost impossible that it was not genuine. But if 
you had put thumb-screws to him, O’Hara would 
have maintained that in some inexplicable manner 
the small, demure, deferential fiend across the 
table was fully aware of the fact that he had not 
been listening—and fully prepared to make his 
unsuspicious colleagues aware of it, too. 

“Part of it did not seem quite clear to me,” he 
said curtly. 

“Not clear?” repeated Celati, his imperturbable 
calm severely ruffled, “what do you say, not clear? 
You find my English at fault, possibly—certainly 
not my explanation. No child could do that.” 

“Surely not,” agreed Mrs. Lindsay, and her 
voice was as soothing as a cool hand, “I confess 
that it struck me as—well—limpid. But perhaps 
Mr. O’Hara will tell us just what part of it he did 
not follow?” 



188 


DELILAH 


“Put it,” said O’Hara, with something peril¬ 
ously like hatred blazing in his eyes, “that I did 
not follow. We are simply wasting time. Will 
someone repeat the alternatives?” 

Mrs. Lindsay’s gravely solicitous eyes met the 
look unflinchingly. “Surely. All this is simply 
wasting time, as you say. It comes down to a 
question as to whether it is preferable for the Ital¬ 
ian Government to countenance or discountenance 
the Papal entry into politics. In the present case 
it is naturally an asset, but it is possible that it 
might entail serious consequences. I put it 
baldly and clumsily, but I am trying to be quite 
clear.” 

“You are succeeding admirably,” O’Hara as¬ 
sured her. He was dangerously angry, with the 
violent and sickening anger of a man who had been 
made a fool of—and who has richly deserved it. 
“As you say, it is—limpid. But why not a third 
alternative? Why should the Italian Government 
do anything at all ? Why not simply lie quiet and 
play safe? It would not be for the first time.” 

“Mr. O’Hara!” Celati was on his feet, white 
to the lips. 

Mrs. Lindsay stretched out her hands with a 
prettily eloquent gesture of despair. “Oh, really!” 
she said quietly. “Is this kind of thing necessary? 
We are all working together for the same purpose 


DELILAH 


189 


—a purpose that has surely too much dignity to be 
degraded to such pettiness. Mr. O’Hara, I beg of 
you-” 

44 It is not necessary to beg of me.” He leaned 
across the table, something boyish and winning in 
his face, his hand outstretched. 44 1 say, Celati, 
I’m no end of a bounder; do let me off this once— 
I’m bone tired—haven’t slept for nights, trying to 
think of ways through this beastly mess. I don’t 
know what I’m saying, and that’s Heaven’s truth. 
Is it all right?” 

44 Quite. We are, I think, all tired.” 

44 Men,” Mrs. Lindsay murmured gently—“men 
are really wonderful. What two women would 
have done that?” 

O’Hara considered her for a moment in silence. 

“Is that a tribute you are paying us?” he in¬ 
quired quite as gently 

“Why, what else?” Again the soft amaze¬ 
ment. 

44 1 was seeking information. It struck me as 
ambiguous.” 

Mrs. Lindsay smiled, that enigmatic smile, wist¬ 
ful and ironic. 44 It is undue humility on your 
part, believe me. But shan’t we get back to the 
matter in hand? Monsieur De Nemours, what is 
your opinion?” 

44 1 think there is much in Mr. O’Hara’s sug- 




190 


DELILAH 


gestion that the Government should not be over¬ 
precipitate,” replied De Nemours pleasantly. He 
was horribly bored; politics, unless they con¬ 
cerned France, bored him almost beyond endur¬ 
ance, but his ennui was somewhat alleviated by the 
fact that a very pretty woman was asking him a 
question. “If silence were maintained for a few 
weeks, it might well be-” 

O’Hara was listening—fiercely. He was sure 
that he could smell violets somewhere; why didn’t 
the woman take her hands off the table? They lay 
there, white and fragile and helpless, like broken 
flowers. Why didn’t she wear a wedding ring? 
Why—he jerked his tired mind back savagely to 
De Nemours’ easy, fluent voice, his tired eyes 
to the wcrn but amiable mask that the Frenchman 
substituted for a face. Why didn’t he stop 
talking? 

“We, in France, have been learning tolerance to 
God as well as to man,” he was saying. “Possibly 
before the war we have been drastic, but the truly 
remarkable revival-” 

France again! France and Italy and Oregon— 
on and on and on—the clock on the mantel clicked 
away the minutes ruthlessly, the precious minutes 
that belonged to a dying world. It was striking 
eleven when Mrs. Lindsay rose. 

“Then that’s cleared up, I think,” she said. 





DELILAH 


191 


“We begin the regular routine to-morrow morning, 
don’t we? Half-past nine? And here?” 

“The house has been placed at my disposal,” 
replied O’Hara formally. “I have placed it at the 
Committee’s. It has proved a convenient ar¬ 
rangement.” 

“Are the night sessions usual?” she asked. 

“Usual? I don’t know.” He looked at her 
wearily; how could any one emerge from that har¬ 
rowing bickering and manoeuvering so fresh and un¬ 
touched and shining? “We have them when it 
seems necessary—how often should you say, De 
Nemours?” 

“Never mind.” The cool fingers were touching 
his; she was going. “I will keep my evenings free, 
too—I was simply wondering what to do about 
some invitations. But nothing else counts, of 
course, does it? Do get a good rest; you look so 
tired. Good-night.” She smiled, nodded the 
golden head graciously, and was gone. 

O’Hara stood gazing blankly at the closed door 
for a moment—then he swung across the room, 
flung the windows up with a carefully controlled 
violence, and stood leaning heavily against its 
frame, his shoulders sagging suddenly, his tired 
young face turned to the stars. 

“You find it too warm?” De Nemours inquired 
courteously. 


192 


DELILAH 


“No—I don’t know. Those beastly vio¬ 
lets-” 

“Violets?” De Nemours waited with raised 
brows. 

“The first time the poison gas came over at 
Ypres, the chap standing next to me said, ‘Funny 
—there’s a jolly smell of violets about.’ Violets 
—God!” His voice twisted—broke. But after 
a minute he continued casually: “Rotten trick 
to have your senses go back on you like that, what? 
They’re the little beggars Nature has given us for 
guards and watchmen and here one of them turns 
traitor and instead of shrieking ‘Careful—careful 
—the ugliest poison ever found is touching you!’ 
it whispers ‘ See, it smells of violets—oh, England— 
oh, Spring.’ Damned traitors, the lot of them— 
for ever telling us that poison is sweet!” 

“Why, so it is,” murmured De Nemours. 
“Many and many a time. But where were the 
violets to-night, mon ami?'' 

O’Hara jerked about incredulously, “What! you 
didn’t smell them? Why, every time she moved 
the air was thick with them!” 

“Ah, Youth!” Irony and regret tempered the 
low laughter. “One must be young indeed to 
smell violets when a woman moves!” 

Celati stirred slightly. “A most remarkable 
woman, this Mrs. Lindsay.” 




DELILAH 


193 


“Remarkable, indeed. There is something 

about her fine and direct-” 

O’Hara stared at him aghast. “Direct? Man, 
but you’re mad! The woman’s tortuous as a 
winding lane—and it’s a dark place it leads to, I’m 
thinking.” 

De Nemours yielded once more to indulgent 
mirth, “Pauvre ami, those nerves of yours play 
tricks with you! Mrs. Lindsay is a woman with an 
exceptional mind of which she makes exceptional 
use. She is a beautiful woman, but alas, she does 
not remind you of it. She is entirely devoted to 
her work, she shows tact and courage, a rare dis¬ 
cretion, a fine simplicity-” 

“Oh, God!” There was something very like 
despair in O’Hara’s mirth. “Simplicity, by the 
Almighty! Because she wears blue serge instead 
of white lace? Why, I tell you that she trails 
yards of chiffon behind her when she goes, that her 
eyes are for ever smiling at you over a scented fan, 
that there’s always a rose in her hair and a kiss on 
her lips. She’s just as simple as Eve—and she 
still has fast hold of the apple!”* v 

Celati eyed him a trifle sternly. A“ You "object 
to women in politics, Mr. O’Hara?” 1 

“Object? My soul, no! My mother and sister 
are in it up to their eyebrows, and making a rattling 
good job of it, too. But when they play the game, 





194 


DELILAH 


they play it. They leave more trappings than 
their hats and cloaks downstairs; they let you for¬ 
get that they are women, and remember that they 
are human beings.” 

“I find masculine women—distasteful.” 

“I never said that they were masculine,” 
O’Hara retorted sharply, “I said that they were 
first and foremost human beings. Any other 
attitude is fatal. I tell you that this woman 
cares nothing in the world for our game; she is 
playing her own. And she is playing with loaded 
dice.” 

“And what game is she playing, pray?” 

“The oldest game in the world,” said O’Hara. 
“Antony’s dark-eyed Egypt played it, and that 
slim witch, Mary Stuart, and the milliner’s exqui¬ 
site minx, Du Barry. Only they played behind 
silken curtains, with little jewelled hands and 
heads and words. They fight with other weapons 
nowadays, but the stakes haven’t changed since 
Antony lost a world and won a kiss.” 

“And the stakes?” 

“Why, you are the Stake,” said O’Hara. “And 
I—and Celati there; they are playing for Power— 
and Man is Power—and Man, poor fool, is their 
toy. Little Sisters of Circe—they have come out 
from behind their pale silken curtains and stripped 
the jewels from the small hands and perfumed 




DELILAH 


195 


heads and covered their shining shoulders with 
harsh stuffs and schooled their light tongues to 
strange words—and we are blind and mad, and 
call them comrade!” 

“ Tiens, tiensl ” murmured De Nemours, “you 
interest me, O’Hara. I confess that I had failed to 
find this sinister glamour; but you open pleasant 
vistas in a parched land!” 

O’Hara gave him a wrenched smile. “That was 
not my endeavour,” he said briefly. 

Celati rose, a little stiffly. He was a heavy man, 
and oddly deliberate for a Latin. 

“It is late,” he said. “Are you coming, De 
Nemours? Till to-morrow morning, Mr. O’Hara; 
a rivederla .” 

“Good-night,” returned O’Hara. “At nine- 
thirty, then. Good-night.” 

He stood staring down absently at the polished 
surface of the table for a moment or so after the 
door had closed, and then crossed to the open 
window. The stars were shining brightly—but 
they were very far away and cold, the stars. 
There was something nearer and sweeter in the 
quiet room behind him, nearer and sweeter even 
than on that spring day at Ypres. He turned 
from the window with a gesture at once violent and 
weary. Those accursed violets! He could smell 
them still. 


196 


DELILAH 


ii 

“You are taking Lilah Lindsay in to dinner/’ 
said Mrs. Dane. “I am kind to you, you see! 
She’s the most exquisite person.” 

“Exquisite,” O’Hara agreed politely, but there 
was something in his voice that caused Mrs. Dane 
to raise her beautifully pencilled eyebrows. There 
was no doubt about it, her distinguished guest was 
in no transport of enthusiasm as to her adored 
Lilah. Rumour, for once, was correct! She 
glanced toward the door, bit her lip, and then, 
with a swift movement of decision, she turned to . 
the high-backed sofa, her draperies fluttering about 
her as she seated herself. 

“I am so very glad that you came early,” she 
informed him graciously, and O’Hara thought 
again of her astonishing resemblance to a hum¬ 
ming-bird—small and restless and vivid, eternally 
vibrating over some new flower. “I so rarely get 
a chance to talk to you—you are most impressively 
busy, aren’t you? Do you see a great deal of 
Lilah?” 

“Mrs. Lindsay has attended all our conferences 
for the past few weeks.” 

“Oh, of course, but you can hardly get to know 
her there, can you?” 

“Possibly not. However, I have had to content 


DELILAH 


197 


myself with that. She is a very busy woman, of 
course, and my own time is not at my disposal.” 

4< I suppose not,” murmured Mrs. Dane men¬ 
daciously. She supposed nothing of the sort. 
‘‘But you are to be pitied, truly. She is a most 
enchanting person; all the tragedy and cruelty of 
her life have left her as gay and sweet and friendly 
as a child. It’s incredible.” 

“She has had tragedy and cruelty in her life?” 

“Oh, it’s been a nightmare—nothing less. She 
hadn’t been out of her French convent six months 
when she married that beast, Heaven knows why— 
she had every other man in Washington at her 
feet, but he apparently swept her off them! Of 
course, he had a brilliant future before him-” 

“Of course,” murmured O’Hara. 

“What do you mean? Did you know Curran 
Lindsay?” 

“Never heard of him,” O'Hara assured her. 
“But do go on: what happened to the beast’s 
future?” 

She shrugged her white shoulders distastefully. 
“Oh, he died in a sanitarium in California several 
years ago, eaten up with drugs and baffled ambi¬ 
tion.” 

“And languishing away without his favourite 
pastime of beating the lovely Mrs. Lindsay black 
and blue, I suppose?” 




198 


DELILAH 


Mrs. Dane controlled a tremor of annoyance. 
She disliked flippancy and she disliked grimness; 
combined she found them irritating to a really in¬ 
credible degree. “Curran never subjected Lilah 
to physical maltreatment,” she said coldly, “he 
subjected her to something a thousand times more 
intolerable—his adoration.” 

“So the beast adored her?” 

“He was mad about her. You find that un¬ 
likely?” 

“On the contrary,” replied O'Hara amiably, “I 
find it inevitable. But what happened to his 
brilliant career?” 

“Oh, he was crazily, insanely jealous—and 
some devil chose to send him an anonymous letter 
in the middle of a crucial party contest when his 
presence was absolutely vital, saying that Lilah 
was carrying on an affair with an artist in Cali¬ 
fornia, where he’d left her for the winter. He went 
raving made—threw up the whole thing—told his 
backers that they could go to Hell, he was going to 
California—and he went, too.” 

“Ah, Antony, Antony!” O’Hara said softly. 

Mrs. Dane stared at him, wide-eyed. “Why, 
what do you mean? Have you heard the story 
before? ” 

“It sounds, somehow, vaguely familiar,” he 
told her. “There was a woman in Egypt—no— 




DELILAH 


199 

that was an older story than this. Well, what did 
the beast find?” 

“He found Lilah,” replied Mrs. Dane sharply. 
“The artist had promptly blown his brains out 
when she had sent him about his business, as she 
naturally did. But Curran’s contest was lost, and 
so was Curran. He might as well have been Bene¬ 
dict Arnold, from his party’s point of view. He 
went absolutely to pieces; took to drinking more 
and more—then drugs—oh, the whole thing was a 
nightmare!” 

“And the artist blew his brains out, you say?” 

“Yes, it was too tragic. Lilah was almost in 
despair, poor child. He left some dreadful note 
saying that exiles from Paradise had no other home 
than Hell—and that one of them was taking the 
shortest cut to get there. The newspapers got 
hold of it and gave it the most ghastly publicity, 
—you see, everyone had prophesied such wonder¬ 
ful things about his future!” 

“Still, he had dwelt in Paradise,” murmured 
O’Hara. 

“Dwelt? Nonsense—he said that he was an 
exile!” Mrs. Dane’s voice was distinctly sharp, 
but O’Hara smiled down at her imperturbably. 

“Oh, come. It’s a little difficult to be exiled 
from a spot where you’ve never set foot, isn’t it? 
No, I rather fancy that Mrs. Lindsay found conso- 






200 


DELILAH 


lation in the dark hours by remembering that she 
had not always been unkind to the poor exile— 
that in Paradise for a time there had been moon¬ 
light and starlight and sunlight—and that other 
light that never was, on sea or land. It must have 
helped her to remember that.” 

Mrs. Dane dropped her flaming eyes to the fan 
that shook a little in her jewelled hands. Perhaps 
it was best to hold the thunder and lightning that 
she ached to release; after all, it was clearly im¬ 
possible that he should actually mean the sinister 
things that he was implying about her incompara¬ 
ble Lilah! It would be an insult to that radiantly 
serene creature to admit that insult could so much 
as touch her. She raised defiant eyes to his mock¬ 
ing ones. 

“Yes, that’s possible; Lilah is divinely kind to 
any beggar that crosses her path—it isn’t in her to 
hurt a fly, and she must have been gracious to that 
wretched boy until he made it impossible. But 
here is Monsieur De Nemours and the lady herself! 
Let’s go into the next room, shall we? Lilah, you 
lovely wonder, you look sixteen—and young for 
your age, at that. Let’s see, the Havilands aren’t 
here yet, and Bob Hyde telephoned that he and 
Sylvia would be late-” 

O’Hara followed the swift, bird-like voice into 
the next room. By and by it would stop and he 




DELILAH 


201 


and Lilah would have to find words to fill the si¬ 
lence. What words should he choose? He was 
too tired to be careful—too tired to think; what 
devilish Fate was thrusting him into a position 
where he must do both? 

She was talking to De Nemours, the shining 
head tilted back a little, the hushed music of 
her voice drifting across the room to him like 
a little breeze. She had on a black frock, slim 
and straight—not a jewel, not a flower, but all 
of spring laughed and danced and sang and 
sparkled in that upturned face. O’Hara’s hand 
closed sharply on the back of the chair. What if 
he were wrong—if this were all some ugly trick 
that his worn-out nerves were playing? After all, 
Lucia Dane had known her for years, and women’s 
friendships were notoriously exacting. What did 
he know of her save that she was lovely? Ah, 
lovely, lovely to heartbreak, as she stood there 
laughing up at De Nemours—at once still and 
sparkling, in that magical way of hers, like sunshine 
dancing on a quiet pool. Was it some devil in him 
that made him suspect the angel in her? Some¬ 
times he thought that he must be going mad. 

He had been so sure of himself; no woman was to 
touch his life until he had moulded it into its ap¬ 
pointed shape—and then he would find a clear-eyed 
comrade who would be proud and humble in his 



DELILAH 


202 

glory—some girl, wise and tender and simple, who 
would always be waiting, quiet-eyed and quiet- 
hearted when he turned his tired steps to home— 
someone in whose kind arms he would find peace 
and rest and quiet. For he would be Man, the 
conqueror, and he would have deep need of these. 
So he had decreed, during the hard years that 
brought him to this place where, if he stretched 
only a little higher, he could touch the shining 
dreams—and behold, a door had opened and closed, 
and a yellow-haired girl had come in—and his 
ordered world was chaos and madness. He knew, 
with a sense of profoundly rebellious despair, that 
he was out of hand; his nerves had him, and they 
were riding him unmercifully, revenging them¬ 
selves richly for all the days and nights that he had 
crushed them down and scorned them and ignored 
them. They had him now, this arrogant young 
dreamer, out to save a world—they had him now, 
for all his dreams! 

“ Mr. O’Hara, aren’t you taking me in to dinner? ” 

He started as violently as though she had touched 
his bare heart with those soft fingers of hers. 

“You were a thousand miles away,” said the 
fairy voice, and the hand rested lightly on his arm. 
“I hate to bring you back, but they’re all going in, 
you see. Was it a pleasant country that you were 
playing in?” 



DELILAH 


M3 

“Pleasant enough,” he told her hardly. “But 
it’s poor sport looking down on a lost inheritance 
from the edge of a precipice. Did I seem to be 
enjoying it?” 

“You looked as most of us feel on the edge of a 
precipice, I suppose—a little terrified, and a good 
deal thrilled. Was the lost heritage a pretty 
place?” 

“As pretty as most lost places,” said O’Hara. 

Lilah Lindsay leaned toward him, pushing the 
flowers between them a little aside. 

“But why not turn your back on it?” she asked, 
her eyes laughing into his, friendly and adventur¬ 
ous. “You might climb higher up the mountain, 
and find some spot so strange and beautiful that it 
will make the little garden in the valley seem a 
dull spot well lost.” 

“I have already turned my back,” he said. 

“I think that I am glad,” said Lilah Lindsay. 
“You see, you do not belong in the valley. Will 
you tell me something, Mr. O’Hara?” 

“What is there that I can tell you?” 

“Oh, many things. I’m not wisdom incarnate, 
I know, but I have enough wits to realize that 
stupidity has you fast in his clutch if he can once 
get you to stop asking questions. I shall go down 
to my grave with ‘Why? ’ still on my lips, I promise 
you! 


-204 


DELILAH 


“Aren’t you afraid of exhausting our wretched 
little hoard of information?” 

He felt as though some gigantic hand had re¬ 
leased its grasp about his heart. If she would 
only keep the laughter dancing through her lashes 
he was safe. 

“No, no; it’s inexhaustible, if properly handled.” 
Her voice was dancing, too. “I came across an 
old formula once; it’s served me well many and 
many a time, when I’ve seen a resentful and sus¬ 
picious look in some man’s eyes that says, ‘Young 
woman, you are leading me to believe that you 
know more than I do. Young woman, you are 
boring me.’ I can drive that look from any man’s 
eyes in the world!” 

“With what alchemy, little magician?” 

She leaned closer again, and suddenly he smelt 
the violets—the room was full of them—the world 
itself was full of them! 

“Why, I ask him to spell a word; any nice, 
simple word like ‘cat’ or ‘dog,’ so that he will be 
sure to be able to spell it, poor dear! And in 
thirty seconds the sky is blue, and the birds are 
singing, and God’s in his heaven and woman in her 
proper place. It’s white magic, truly!” 

“Truly,” O’Hara laughed back at her, “and 
truly, and truly, I’m believing you.” He felt light¬ 
headed with happiness—oh, surely, this was clear 


DELILAH 


20 5 


candour that she was giving him; all this lovely 
nonsense was cool water to his fever. Lucia Dane 
was right—the rest was ugly madness. “But what 
was the nice simple word that you were going to 
ask me to spell?” 

“It’s rather a long and difficult word, I’m 
afraid,” she said gravely. “I was going to ask how 
you, an Irishman, came to be the British Repre¬ 
sentative in our Council?” 

For a minute all the old, sick suspicion clouded 
the gray laughter of his eyes—his face grew hard 
and still—then the unswerving candour of the 
eyes lifted to his smote him to the heart, and he 
smiled down reassuringly. 

“I suppose that it does seem damned queer. 
But you see, I happen to be British first and Irish 
second. Does that seem impossible? ” 

“No,” she replied slowly, “but it’s unusual, 
isn’t it?” 

“I suppose so. It’s infernally lonely work, I 
can tell you. You see, I was born and bred in 
Dublin; all my family think I’m a black traitor. 
They’re hot against England, and hot against me. 
They won’t believe that Ireland is my heart’s 
heart. But England—oh, she’s the power and the 
glory—she can lift the Irish high and safe out of 
their despair, though it’s blind from weeping the 
poor souls are—they’ll never be seeing it.” 



£06 


DELILAH 


The Irish in him was burning in his eyes and on 
Ills tongue—she stirred and nodded. 

“Yes/’ she said quietly, “I suppose that our 
Southern men who fought for the Union met with 
just such hatred and misunderstanding. And yet 
they were the ones who loved her best, the proud 
and lovely South—they who were willing to bear 
her hatred that they might save her soul.” 

“Oh, it’s the wonder you are for understand¬ 
ing!” His heart was shaking his voice, but the 
callous and greatly bored gentleman on the other 
side of Mrs. Lindsay suddenly raised an energetic 
protest. 

“See here, Lovely Lady, are you going to leave 
me to commune with my soul for the rest of the 
evening? For the last ten minutes I’ve been 
trying-” 

O’Hara turned to the impatient young woman 
on his left, the ardour still lingering in his face. 
It lingered so convincingly that he proceeded to 
thrill her clear through to her small bones; she 
spent the next few days in a state of dreamy preoc¬ 
cupation that fairly distracted her adoring hus¬ 
band, and continued to cherish indefinitely the 
conviction that she had inspired a devastating if 
hopeless passion. It was lucky for her that she 
never knew that all that pulled O’Hara through 
the next ten minutes was a strong effort of the 




DELILAH 


207 


imagination, by which he substituted a head of 
palest gold for the curly brown one and a voice of 
silver magic for some rather shrill chatter. And 
then, suddenly, it was in blessed truth the silver 
voice. 

“You see, I was specially interested in your feel¬ 
ing for Ireland because of the situation touched on 
in your record. That’s serious, isn’t it?” 

“Serious to desperation.” 

“But a great deal of it’s just surmise on your 
part, I suppose?” 

“Surmise?” His voice was suddenly weary. 
“No, no, it’s the rotten truth. All the facts are 
there, even the names of the leaders in the plot.” 

“But how can you be so sure?” 

“I can be sure.” There was a grim certainty in 
his tone that left little room for doubt. 

“You use spies?” 

“Spies? You might call them that. There are 
three ring-leaders in the conspiracy; the youngest 
was my room-mate in college.” 

“I see.” After a moment in which she sat quite 
still, clear-eyed and pensive, she asked, “Now 
that you have all the details of the plot, why don’t 
you crush it?” 

“To do anything now would precipitate the 
bloodiest kind of civil war again. We must move 
with the greatest care; God help Ireland if wind of 


208 


DELILAH 


it reaches the other party. They’re straining at 
the leash like mad dogs already.” 

“England must have great faith in your discre¬ 
tion,” said Lilah Lindsay, and O’Hara’s face sud¬ 
denly flamed like the Crusader’s of old. 

“God grant it’s not misplaced,” he said simply. 
“It’s sleepless I’ve gone these many nights looking 
for a way out—and now I think we’ve found one 
that’s neither too hard nor too weak. It’s been 
weary work hunting it. You see it’s not only Ire¬ 
land we must help; it’s all the little, unhappy 
countries lost in the dark, and like to kill them¬ 
selves before they find the light. Sometimes it 
breaks the heart in your body to watch them.” 
His eyes were sombre with all the useless pain in 
the world. 

“Then don’t let’s watch them for a little while,” 
she said gently. “I should think shame on myself 
for making you talk shop this way; I do, I do! 
But it’s hard to shake it off, isn’t it?” 

“Not when you smile like that.” 

Lilah Lindsay smiled like that again. 

“Now and then,” she murmured, “you are just 
about six years old.” 

“Why did you cut off your hair?” demanded 
O’Hara, and his voice was a trifle unsteady. 

Why ? ’ ’ She brushed it back with light fingers, 
gay as a child once more. “Oh, it used to take me 



DELILAH 


209 


hours to wind it about my head and coil it over my 
ears; it was way below my waist, you know, and I 
found it very distracting, to me and—other people. 
Don’t you like it this way?” 

“Below your waist,” he said. “Oh, then you 
must be a real Fairy Princess, all shining white 
and gold.” 

“But don’t you like it this way?” asked Delilah. 

“It’s beautiful,” said O’Hara. “But in every 
foolish heart of us there’s a lady in a tower to 
whom we call ‘Rappunzel, Rappunzel, let down 
your hair’—waiting to go climbing up the shining 
locks to her heart—and Paradise.” 

Delilah rested her chin on linked fingers, her 
eyes at once dancing and demure. “How lament¬ 
ably old-fashioned you are for all your radicalism. 
Shall I let my hair grow?” 

“It’s the wonder it must be,” he whispered. 
“Breaking and foaming below your waist.” 

“I’ve always thought of it, somehow, as a—a 
symbol,” she said, her eyes fixed on the coffee that 
she was slowly stirring. “When I cut it off, I said 
to each shining length, ‘There you go, Folly—and 
you. Frailty—and you. Weakness-’” 

“And did you never think that your namesake 
must have cried of old to other shining locks 
‘ There you go, Strength? 

The new Delilah looked suddenly enchantingly 



210 


DELILAH 


mischievous. “Well, but that was not her own 
hair! It belonged to a mere man who chose a very 
vulnerable spot to keep his strength. You have 
learned wisdom since Samson.” 

“I wonder!” said O'Hara. 

“I’ll remember what you have told me,” she 
laughed up at him. “You seem to hold that 
woman’s strength, too, is in her hair. Perhaps— 
perhaps you are right, after all. Will you come to 
see me one of these days, and try to convert 
me?” 

They were all standing; he rose, too, his eyes 
holding her. 

“When may I come—to-morrow?” 

She smiled back at his swift urgency—then bent 
the primrose head in assent. O’Hara held back 
the curtains for her to pass through. 

“To-morrow,” he told her, his eyes still lit with 
that incredulous wonder. “To-morrow is a great 
way off!” 

hi 

! 

“I’ll just wait here,” he said to the pretty maid. 
“I’m not dressed for a party. You might tell Mrs. 
Lindsay that—that when she’s not too busy, I’d 
like awfully to speak to her for a minute.” 

“Very well, Mr. O’Hara.” Her voice had all 
the impersonal blankness of the well-trained ser¬ 
vant, but once on the dark stairs she shook her 



DELILAH 211 

glossy head dismally. She had come to know him 
well in the past weeks. 

“The Saints preserve the poor man, it’s fit for a 
long rest in a pine box he’s looking, and that’s no 
lie at all! And it’s my fine lady upstairs that is 
after painting shadows black as the pit under his 
poor eyes, or my name’s not Bridget O’Neill. 
It’s a wicked world entirely, and that’s what it is!” 

O’Hara stood watching the door through which 
she had vanished. In a minute—in five minutes— 
in ten minutes—someone else might stand framed 
in that door; he could not tear his eyes from it, but 
stood staring, hands thrust deep into his pockets, 
very quiet, with fever playing behind the tense 
stillness of his face. The painted clock on the 
mantel chimed the hour out twelve times, each 
stroke a mocking peal of laughter. His shoulders 
sagged abruptly and he turned from the door. 
What was the use?—she wasn’t coming. She 
would never come again. 

He crossed to the mantel slowly, noting all 
the studied grace with desperate tenderness. To 
whom could it belong but Lilah, the little room 
that he loved, demure and gay—intimate as a 
boudoir, formal as a study? Those slim hands of 
hers must have placed the bright flowers in the low 
bowls of powdered Venetian glass, and lined the 
bookcases with deep-coloured books, set the small 


212 


DELILAH 


bright fire burning with pine cones, and lighted the 
waxen candles that were casting their gracious 
light all about him. The satin-wood desk looked 
austere enough, with its orderly stacks of paper, its 
trays of sharpened pencils and shining pens—but 
the lace pillow in the deep chair by the fire was a 
little crumpled, there was a half-burnt cigarette in 
the enamelled tray, and trailing its rosy grace 
shamelessly across a sombre cushion was a bit of 
chiffon and ribbon, the needle still sticking in it. 
It could not have been so long ago that she had 
been here; all the dainty disorder spoke eloquently 
of her still. 

Oh, thrice-accursed fool that he had been to risk 
even for a second the happiness that for weeks had 
been fluttering closer to him—the happiness that 
only a day before had almost closed its shining 
wings about him! They had been looking at some 
of her old snapshots of a motor trip through Ire¬ 
land, laughing together in the enchanted intimacy 
which they had acquired over the begoggled, be- 
veiled, and beswaddled small creature that she 
assured him was her exquisite self—and then she 
had come upon a snapshot that was only too 
obviously not Ireland. It was of a vine-hung ter¬ 
race, with the sea stretching far out in the dis¬ 
tance, and the sunlight dappling through onto the 
upturned face of a man—quite a young man, in 


DELILAH 


213 


white flannels, swinging a careless tennis racquet 
and laughing in the sun. For a minute her sure 
fingers had faltered; there, very deliberately, she 
had picked it up, tearing it into small pieces, drop¬ 
ping them deftly into the dancing fire. 

“Here’s one of us having tea by the road,” she 
had continued evenly, but O’Hara had not even 
heard her. His mind was far away, sick with ap¬ 
prehension and suspicion, all the old dim terrors 
suddenly rampant. 

“Lilah—it’s unspeakable of me to worry you 
with this—but I can’t get it out of my mind some¬ 
how. Will you tell me—will you tell me if they 
ever found out who sent that anonymous letter to 
your husband?” 

She had stared back at him with strange eyes 
set in a face from which every trace of emotion had 
suddenly been frozen. 

“The letter? No.” The small remote voice 
was utterly forbidding. “You are quite right; 
it is cruel to remind of those times. What differ¬ 
ence can it possibly make to you?” 

He had fought desperately to find some words 
that would show her what need his sick soul had of 
assurance, but he had found none. He could only 
stare at her dumbly, his wretched eyes assuring 
that it made, somehow, a huge difference. 

“But why?” 



214 


DELILAH 


And he had cried hopelessly, “Oh, I may be 
mad—I think I am—but I can’t get it out of my 
head. I keep wondering whether you—if you 
sent-” 

“I? ” She had cried out as sharply as though he 
had struck her, and then sat very still, fighting her 
way back to composure, inch by inch. When she 
spoke again her voice was very low, incredibly 
controlled. 

“You are implying something that is too mon¬ 
strous for sanity. May I ask what motive—what 
possible motive, however abominable—you think 
that I could have had for wrecking my husband’s 
career?” 

He had whispered, “Oh, God forgive me, what 
motive had Antony’s Egypt? What motive have 
any of you for flaunting your power over us? You 
crack the whip, and we go crashing through the hoop 
of our dreams, smashing it—smashing it for ever.” 

She had risen then, sweeping him from brow to 
heel with her unrelenting eyes. 

“How you know us!” His heart had sickened 
under that terrible small laugh, cold as frozen 
water. And she had turned to the door, her head 
high. “ If you can think such things of me—if you 
can even dream them—your presence here is sim¬ 
ply an insult to us both. I must ask you to leave. 
And unless you realize the grotesque madness of 





DELILAH 


215 


your accusation, I must ask you not to come here 
again. That releases you from dinner to-morrow 
night, naturally. I don’t think that there is any¬ 
thing more to be said.” 

No, there had been nothing more to be said— 
nothing. He could not remember how he had 
got himself out of the house—he could not remem¬ 
ber anything save a dull nightmare of vacillation 
and despair, that had finally driven him back to the 
little room, whipped and beaten, ready to capitu¬ 
late on any terms—ready for any life that would 
buy him a moment’s happiness. And now—now 
she would not come, even to accept his surrender. 
He turned from the mantel violently, and felt his 
heart contract in swift panic. A man was watch¬ 
ing him intently from the other end of the room— 
a man with a hateful, twisted face—he caught his 
breath in a shaken laugh. Those damned nerves 
of his would wreck him yet! It was only his re¬ 
flection in the cloudy Venetian mirror; the firelight 
and candlelight played strange tricks with it, 
shadowing it grotesquely—still, even looked at 
closely, it was nothing to boast of. He stood con¬ 
templating it grimly with its tortured mouth and 
haunted eyes—and then suddenly the air was full 
of violets. He turned slowly, a strange peace 
holding his tired heart. She had come to him; 
nothing else would ever matter again. 



216 


DELILAH 


She was standing in the doorway, a little cloud of 
palest gray. It was the first time that he had 
seen her in light colours, and she had done some¬ 
thing to her hair—caught it up with a great spar¬ 
kling comb—it shone like pale fire. Her arms were 
quite full of violets—the largest ones that he had 
ever seen, like purple pansies. He stood drinking 
her in with his tired eyes, not even looking for 
words. It was she who spoke. 

“ Bridget told me that you were here. I thought 
that you were not coming to-night.” 

He shook his head, with a torn and lamentable 
smile. “You said—until I realized my mad¬ 
ness. Believe me—believe me, I have realized 
it, Lilah.” 

She came slowly into the room, but the nearer 
she came to him the farther she seemed away, 
secure in her ethereal loveliness, her velvet eyes 
turned to ice. 

“You have realized it, I am afraid, too late. 
There are still two tables of bridge upstairs; I have 
only a few minutes to give you. Was there any¬ 
thing that you wished to say?” 

He shook his head dumbly, and she sank into 
the great chair, stifling a small yawn perfunctorily. 

“Oh, I’m deathly tired. It’s been a hideous 
evening, from beginning to end. Come, amuse me, 
good tragedian, make me laugh just once, and I 



DELILAH 


217 


may forgive you. I may forgive you, even though 
you do not desire it.” Again that fleeting smile, 
exquisite and terrible. 

But O’Hara was on his knees beside her. 

“Delilah, don’t laugh, don’t laugh—I’m telling 
you the laughter is dead in me. I’d rather see you 
weeping for the poor, blind fool who lost the key to 
Paradise.” 

“Who threw it away,” she amended, touching 
the violets with light fingers. “But never forget, 
it’s better not to have set your foot within its gates 
than to be exiled from it. Never forget that, my 
tragedian.” 

He raised his head, haggard and alert. “Lilah, 
what do you mean?” 

“Wfliy, nothing—only Lucia Dane was here for 
dinner and she thought it—strange—that you 
and I should be the gossip of Washington these 
days. When she had finished with what you 
had said to her, I thought it strange, too. And I 
assured her that there would be no more cause for 
gossip.” 

“I was mad when I talked to that little fool,” he 
told her fiercely. “Clean out of my head trying 
to fight off your magic. That was the first night 
—the first night that I owned to myself that I 
loved you.” 

“Your madness seems to be recurrent,” she 



218 DELILAH 

murmured. 44 You should take measures against 
it.” 

44 1 have taken measures. It shall never touch 
you again. I know now that it has simply been an 
obsession—a hallucination—anything in Heaven or 
Hell that you want to call it. You have all my 
trust, all my faith.” 

44 It is a terrible thing not to trust a woman,” 
she said. 44 More terrible than you know. Some¬ 
times it makes her unworthy of trust.” 

44 Not you,” he whispered. 44 Never.” 

44 We’re delicate machinery, tragedian. Touch 
a hidden spring in us with your clumsy fingers and 
the little thing that was ticking away as faithfully 
and peacefully as an alarm-clock stops for a 
minute—and then goes on ticking. Only it has 
turned to an infernal machine—and it will destroy 
you.” 

She was silent for a moment, her fingers resting 
lightly on that bowed head. When she spoke 
again her voice was gentle. 44 Last night, after 
you had gone, I remembered what you had said 
about Antony and his Egypt, and I found the play. 
Parts of it still go singing through my head. They 
loved each other so, those two magnificent fools. 
He finds her treacherous a hundred times, and 
each time forgives her, and loves her again—and 
she repays him beyond belief—far, far beyond 





DELILAH 


219 


power and treachery and death. Do you remem¬ 
ber his cry in that first hour of his disaster? 

“ ‘O, whither hast thou led me, Egypt?’ 

“And when she weeps for pardon, how he tells her 

“ ‘Fall not a tear, I say: one of them rates 
All that is won and lost. Give me a kiss. 

Even this repays me.’ 

“Though she has ruined him utterly—though he 
sees it and cries aloud 

“ ‘O this false soul of Egypt! this grave charm,— 

Whose eye becked forth my wars, and called them 
home. 

Like a right gipsy hath at false and loose 
Beguiled me to the very heart of loss.’ 

“Still, still his last thought is to reach her arms. 

‘I am dying, Egypt, dying, only 
I here importune death awhile, until 
Of many thousand kisses the poor last 
I lay upon thy lips.’ ” 

“Why, he was well repaid,” said that strange, 
humble voice. 

“I am glad that you feel that,” Delilah told him, 
and she rose swiftly. “Would you like to kiss me? 
You see, I have ruined you.” 

O’Hara stumbled to his feet. 

“What are you saying?” he whispered, a dread¬ 
ful incredulity driving the words through his 
stiffened lips. 


DELILAH 


220 

“That I have ruined you. I have sent your 
notes on the Irish situation to the other party.” 

“You are mad.” 

“No, no.” She shook her head reassuringly. 
“Quite sane. I didn’t address them in my own 
handwriting, naturally. The envelope is type¬ 
written, but the notes are in long-hand; yours. 
The English Government will be forced to believe 
that for once it has misplaced its trust—but Ire¬ 
land should pay you well—if she lives through 
civil war.” 

“By God-” His voice failed him for a 

moment. “This is some filthy dream.” 

“No dream, believe me.” She came closer to 
him, radiant and serene. “Did you think that I 
was a yellow-headed doll, that you could insult me 
beyond belief, mock me to my friends, slander me 
to the Committee of which I was a member? 
Monsieur De Nemours was good enough to warn me 
against you, also. I am no doll, you see; I happen 
to be a woman. We have not yet mastered that 
curiously devised code that you are pleased to 
term Honour—a code which permits you to betray 
a woman but not a secret—to cheat a man out of 
millions in business but not out of a cent at cards. 
It’s a little artificial, and we’re ridiculously primi¬ 
tive. We use lynch-law still; swift justice with the 
nearest weapon at hand.” 





DELILAH 


221 

O’Hara was shaking like a man in a chill, his 
voice hardly above a whisper. “What have you 
done? What have you done, Delilah?” 

“Don’t you understand?” She spoke with 
pretty patience, as though to some backward child. 
“I have ruined you—you and your Ireland, too. 
I sent-” 

And suddenly, shaken and breathless, she was 
in his arms. 

“Oh, Ireland—Ireland and I!” But even at 
that strange cry she never stirred. “It’s you— 
you who are ruined, my Magic—and it’s I who 
have done it, driving you to this ugly madness." 
He held her as though he would never let her go, 
sheltering the bowed golden head with his hand. 
“Though I forgive you a thousand thousand 
times, how will you forgive yourself, my little 
Love? You who would not hurt a flower, where 
will you turn when you see what you have done?” 

He could feel her tears on his hand; she was 
weeping piteously, like a terrified child. 

“Oh, you do love me, you do love me! I was so 
frightened—I thought that you would never love 
me. 

He held her closer, infinitely careful of that 
shining fragility. 

“I love nothing else.” 

“Not Ireland?” 



DELILAH 


222 

He closed his hunted eyes, shutting out Memory. 

“I hated Ireland,” wept the small voice fiercely, 
“because you loved her so.” 

“Hush, hush, my Heart.” 

“But you do—you do love me best?” 

“God forgive me, will you make me say so?” 

There was a moment’s silence, then something 
brushed his hand, light as a flower, and Delilah 
raised her head. 

“No, no, wait.” She was laughing, tremulous 
and exquisite. “Did you think—did you think 
that I had really sent your notes?” 

O’Hara felt madness touching him; he stared 
down at her, voiceless. 

“But of course, of course, I never sent them. 
They are upstairs; wait, I’ll get them for you— 
wait!” 

She slipped from his arms and was half way to 
the door before his voice arrested her. 

“Lilah!” 

“Yes?” 

“You say—that you have not sent the notes?” 

“Darling idiot, how could you have thought that 
I would send them? This is Life, not melodrama!” 

“You never—you never thought of sending 
them?” 

“Never, never.” Her laughter rippled about 
him. “I wanted to see-” 



DELILAH 


223 


But he was groping for the mantel, sick and 
dizzy now that there was no need of courage. 
Delilah was at his side in a flash, her arms about 
him. 

“Oh, my dear!” He had found the chair but 
she still clung to him. “What is it? You’re ill— 
you’re ill!” 

Someone was coming down the stairs; she 
straightened to rigidity, and was at the door in 
a flash. 

“Captain Lawrence!” 

The young Englishman halted abruptly— 
wheeled. 

“Captain Lawrence, Mr. O’Hara is here; he had 
to see me about some papers, and he has been 
taken ill. He’s been overworking hideously lately. 
Will you get me some brandy for him?” 

“Oh, I say, what rotten luck!” He lingered, 
concern touching his pleasant boyish face. 
“Where do I get the brandy, Mrs. Lindsay?” 

“Ask Lucia Dane, she knows how to get hold of 
the maids. And hurry, will you?” 

She was back at his side before the words had 
left; he could feel her fingers brushing his face like 
frightened butterflies, but he did not open his eyes. 
He was too mortally tired to lift his lids. 

“Here you are, Mrs. Lindsay. Try this, old 
son. Steady does it.” 


224 


DELILAH 


He swallowed, choked, felt the warm fire sweep 
through him, tried to smile, tried to rise. 

“No, no, don’t move—don’t let him move, 
Captain Lawrence.” 

“You stay where you are for a bit, young feller, 
my lad. Awfully sorry that I have to run, Mrs. 
Lindsay, but they telephoned for me from the 
Embassy. Some excitement about Turkey, the 
devil swallow them all. Good-night—take it easy, 
O’Hara!” 

“Oh, Captain Lawrence!” He turned again. 
“Have you the letter that I asked you to mail?” 

“Surely, right here. I’ll post it on my way 
over.” 

“Thanks a lot, but I’ve decided not to send it, 
after all.” She stretched out her hand, smiling. 
“It’s an article on women in public life, and it’s 
going to need quite a few changes under the cir¬ 
cumstances.” 

“The circumstances?” 

“Yes. You might tell them at the Embassy— 
if they’re interested. I’m handing in my resigna¬ 
tion on the International Committee to-morrow.” 

O’Hara gripped the arm of his chair until he felt 
it crack beneath his fingers. Captain Lawrence 
was staring at her in undisguised amazement. 

“But I say! How in the world will they get 
along without you?” 



DELILAH 


225 


“Oh, they’ll get along admirably.” She dis¬ 
missed it as easily as though it were a luncheon 
engagement. “That young Lyons is the very 
man they need; he’s really brilliant and a 
perfect encyclopaedia of information. I’ll see 
you at the Embassy on Friday, won’t I? Good¬ 
night.” 

Her arms were about O’Hara before the hall door 
slammed. 

“You’re better now? All right? Oh, you 
frightened me so! It wasn’t that foolish trick of 
mine that hurt you? Say no, say no—I couldn’t 
ever hurt you!” 

“Never. I should be whipped for frightening 
you.” His arms were fast about her, but his eyes 
were straying. What had she done with that 
letter? He had caught a glimpse of it, quite a 
bulky letter, in a large envelope, with a type¬ 
written address—typewritten. 

“Have you noticed my hair?” The magic 
voice was touched with gayety again, and O’Hara 
brushed the silken mist with his lips, his eyes still 
seeking. “I remembered what you said, you see; 
it grows most awfully fast—one of these days it 
will be as long as Rappunzel’s or Melisande’s. 
Will you like it then?” 

Ah, there it was, face down on the lacquer table. 
He drew a deep breath. 


226 


DELILAH 


“Lilah, that letter—what did you say was in 
that letter?” 

There was a sudden stillness in the room; he 
could hear the painted clock ticking clearly. 
Then she spoke quietly: 

“It’s an article that I have written on women in 
public life. Didn’t you hear me telling Captain 
Lawrence?” 

“Will you let me see it?” 

Again that stillness; then, very gently, Delilah 
pushed away his arms and rose. 

“No,” she said. 

“You will not?” 

“No.” The low voice was inflexible. “I know 
what you are thinking. You are thinking that 
those are the Irish notes; that I had fully intended 
to send them this evening; that it was only an im¬ 
pulse of mine that saved you, as it would have been 
an impulse that wrecked you. You are thinking 
that next time it may fall differently. And you 
are willing to believe me guilty until I am proved 
innocent. You have always been that—always.” 

He bowed his head. 

“I could hand you that envelope and prove that 
I am entirely innocent, but I’ll not purchase your 
confidence. It should be a gift—oh, it should be 
more. It is a debt that you owe me. Are you 
going to pay it?” 



DELILAH 


227 


O’Hara raised haggard eyes to hers. 

“How should I pay it?” 

“If you insist on seeing this, I will show it to 
you; but I swear to you that I will never permit 
you to enter this house again; I swear it. Do you 
believe me?” 

“Yes.” 

“If you will trust me, I will give you your notes, 
love you for the rest of my life—marry you to¬ 
morrow.” She went to the table, picked up the 
envelope, and stood waiting. “What shall I do?” 

He rose unsteadily, catching at the mantel. 
No use—he was beaten. 

“Will you get me the notes?” 

He saw her shake then, violently, from head to 
foot, but her eyes never wavered. She nodded, 
and was gone. 

He stood leaning against the mantel, his dark 
head buried in his arms. Beaten! He would 
never know what was in that envelope—never, 
never. She could talk to all Eternity about faith 
and trust; he would go wondering all his life 
through. If he had stood his ground—if he had 
claimed the envelope and she had been proven 
innocent, he would have lost her but he would have 
found his faith. He had sold his soul to purchase 
her body. The painted clock struck once, and he 
raised his head- 





228 


DELILAH 


No, no, lie was mad. She was right—entirely, 
absolutely right—she was just and merciful, she 
who might have scourged him from her sight 
for ever. What reason in heaven or earth had 
he to distrust her? Because her voice was silver 
and her hair was gold? Because violets scattered 
their fragrance when she stirred? Oh, his folly 
was thrice damned. If he had a thousand proofs 
against her, he should still trust her. What was it 
that that chap Browning said? 

“What so false as truth is 
False to thee?” 

That was what love should be—not this sick and 
faltering thing- 

“Here are the notes,” said Delilah’s voice at his 
shoulder, and her eyes added, wistful and sub¬ 
missive: “And here am I.” 

O’Hara took them in silence, his fingers folding 
them mechanically, measuring, weighing, ap¬ 
praising. The envelope could have held them 
easily- 

She turned from him with a little cry. 

“Oh, you are cruel, cruel!” 

He stood staring at her for a moment—at the 
small, desolate figure with its bowed head, one arm 
flung across her eyes like a stricken child—and 
suddenly his heart melted within him. She was 




DELILAH 


229 


weeping, and he had made her weep. He took a 
swift step toward her, and halted. In the mirror 
at the far end of the room he could see her, dimly 
caught between firelight and candlelight, shadowy 
and lovely—in the mirror at the far end of the room 
she was smiling, mischievous and tragic and tri¬ 
umphant. He stared incredulously—and then 
swept her to him despairingly, burying his treach¬ 
erous eyes in the bright hair in which clustered 
the invisible violets. 


HER GRACE 


T HE first time that the Black Duke saw her 
she was laughing—and the last time that 
he saw her she was laughing, too. 

He and a ruddy-faced companion had fared 
forth doggedly into the long summer twilight in 
quest of some amusement to dispel the memory of 
the extravagantly gloomy little dinner that they 
had shared at the club, followed by a painful hour 
over admirable port and still more admirable 
cigars. It was August, and London was empty as 
a drum of the pretty faces and pretty hats and 
pretty voices that made it tolerable at times—it 
was as dry and dusty as life itself, and John Saint 
Michael Beauclerc, ninth Duke of Bolingham, 
tramping along the dull street beside a dull com¬ 
rade, thought to himself with a sudden alien 
passion that youth was a poor thing to look back 
on, and age an ugly thing to look forward to, and 
middle age worse than either. He scowled down 
magnificently from his great height at the once- 
gregarious Banford, whose flushed countenance 
bore the consternation of one who has made a bad 


230 


HER GRACE 


231 


bargain and sees no way out of it—no duke lived 
who was worth such an evening, said Gaddy Ban- 
ford’s hunted eyes. This particular duke eyed 
him sardonically. 

“Close on to nine,” he said. “Well, then, what 
time does this holy paragon do her turn?” 

“About nine,” replied his unhappy host. “But, 
I say, you know, I don’t want to drag you around 
if you’d rather not. She’s frightfully good in her 
line, but if dancing bores you-” 

“You’re dashed considerate all at once,” re¬ 
marked his guest. “If I haven’t cracked by now, 
I fancy I’ll live through the best dancing of the 
century. That’s what you called it, wasn’t it? 
Here, you!” 

He waved an imperious hand at a forlorn han¬ 
som clattering down the silent street, and it jolted 
to a halt under one of the gas lamps. For it was 
not in this century that the Duke of Bolingham 
met Miss Biddy O’Rourke. No, it was in a cen¬ 
tury when hansom cabs and gas lamps were com¬ 
monplaces—when ladies wore bonnets like butter¬ 
flies on piled-up ringlets, and waltzed for hours in 
satin slippers and kid gloves two sizes too small for 
them—when gentlemen cursed eloquently but 
noiselessly because maidens whisked yards of tulle 
and tarlatan behind them when they danced—a 
century of faded flowers and fresh sentiments and 




232 


HER GRACE 


enormous sleeves—of conservatories and cotillions 
and conventions—of long, long letters and little 
perfumed notes—of intrigues over tea tables, and 
coaching parties to the races, and Parma violets, 
and pretty manners, and broken hearts. A thou¬ 
sand years ago, you might think, but after all it 
was only around the corner of the last century that 
the Duke of Bolingham stepped into the decrepit 
hansom closely followed by his unwilling retainer, 
and in no uncertain tones bade the driver proceed 
to the Liberty Music Hall. 

He sat cloaked in silence while they drove, his 
heavy shoulders hunched up, his eyes half closed, 
brooding like a despoiled monarch and a cheated 
child over the sorry trick that life had played him. 
He had had everything—and he had found nothing 
worth having. He had the greatest fortune in 
England—and one of the greatest names. He had 
Beaton House, the Georgian miracle that was all 
London’s pride—and Gray Courts, that dream of 
sombre beauty, that was all England’s pride— 
Gray Courts that even now held his three tall, 
black-browed sons who could shoot and hunt and 
swear as well as any in the country—yes, even 
fourteen-year Roddy. That held, too, a collection 
of Spanish and Portuguese armour second to none, 
and a collection of Van Dykes first of any, and the 
finest clipped yew hedge in a thousand miles. 






HER GRACE 


233 


That held the ladies Pamela, Clarissa, Maud, and 
Charlotte, his good sisters, too acidulous to find a 
husband between them, for all their great dowers 
and name and accomplishments. That for six 
long years had held the Lady Alicia Honoria 
Fortescue, a poor, sad, dull little creature, married 
in a moment of pity and illusion when they were 
both young enough to know better, who had 
gone in mortal terror of him from the night that 
they crossed the threshold of the Damask Room to 
the day that they laid her away under the kind 
marble in the little chapel. 

He sat huddled in the corner of the hansom, re¬ 
membering with the same shock of sick amazement 
his despair at the discovery of her fear of him; it 
still haunted every tapestried corridor of Gray 
Courts—every panelled hall in Beaton House—he 
set his teeth and turned his head, and swore that 
he would take the next boat to France and drink 
himself to death in Cannes. And the hansom cab 
stopped. 

Gaddy Banford had two seats in the first row of 
stalls; had ’em for every night that the lady 
danced, he informed the duke with chastened pride. 
The duke, trampling over the outraged spectators 
with more than royal indifference, eyed him grimly. 

“Spend the rest of your valuable time hanging 
round the stage door, what?” he inquired audibly. 




234 


HER GRACE 


Five of the outraged spectators said 4 4 Sh-s-h, 5 5 and 
the duke, squaring about in his seat, favoured them 
with so black a glance that the admonitions died 
on their lips and apologies gathered in their eyes. 
Banford smiled nervously and ingratiatingly. 

44 Oh, rather not—no, no, nothing of that kind 
whatever. She doesn’t go in for stage-door meet¬ 
ings, you know. I’ve had the honour of meeting 
the lady twice and she’s most frightfully jolly and 
all that, but-” 

44 Sh-h-h,” enjoined one rebellious spirit, studi¬ 
ously avoiding the duke’s eye. That gentleman 
remarked 44 Ha!” with derisive inflection and 
turned a contemptuous eye on the stage. A very 
large and apparently intoxicated mouse was chas¬ 
ing a small and agitated cat with rhythmic zest, the 
two having concluded the more technical portion of 
their programme, in which they had ably defended 
against all comers their engaging title of the 44 Jolly 
Joralomons, Europe, Asia, Africa, and America’s 
Most Unique and Mirth Compelling Acrobats, 
Tumblers, and Jugglers.” The Jolly Joralomons 
scampered light-heartedly off, rolling their equip¬ 
ment of bright balls before them with dexterous 
paws, and capered back even more light-heartedly 
to blow grateful kisses off the tips of their whiskers 
to an enraptured audience, with which the Duke of 
Bolingham was all +oo obviously not in accord. 



HER GRACE 


235 


“Gad!” he remarked with appalled conviction. 
“Death’s too good for them! Here, let’s get out 
of this while I’ve got strength-” 

Banford lifted a pleading hand. There was a 
warning roll of drums, a preliminary lilt of violins, 
and the orchestra swung triumphantly into the 
“Biddy Waltz”—the waltz that all London had re¬ 
volved to for three good months. The house 
sighed like a delighted child, and far up in the 
gallery an ecstatic voice called “Ah, there, lassie!” 
And another echoed “Come ahn, Biddy—Alf and 
me’s ’ere!” 

And onto a stage that was black as night, with 
one great bound as though she had leapt through 
infinite space from a falling star into the small safe 
circle of the spotlight, came Biddy O’Rourke, 
straight on the tips of her silver toes, with laughter 
for a dark world in both her outstretched hands— 
and the piece of the world that faced her rose to its 
feet and shouted a welcome. All but one. 

The Black Duke of Bolingham sat square in the 
centre in the first row of seats in the Liberty Music 
Hall as still as though he had been struck down by 
lightning, with the “Biddy Waltz” rising and falling 
about him unheeded, his eyes fixed incredulously 
on the Vision in the spotlight. The Vision had 
already fixed the eyes and turned the heads and 
broken the hearts of half the masculine popu- 



HER GRACE 


236 

lation of London (the other half not having seen 
her!) but nothing that the duke had heard had pre¬ 
pared him for this. 

Who could have told him that a music hall 

i 

dancer called Biddy O’Rourke, late of Dublin, 
no taller than a child and seventeen years old 
to the day, could look like a fairy and an angel 
and an imp and a witch and a dream? Not Gaddy 
Banford, of a certainty—not Gaddy, who, in a 
burst of lyric enthusiasm, had confided to his duke 
that she was little and blonde and light on her feet. 
“Little”—you who were more fantastically minute 
than any elf, Biddy! Blonde—oh, sacrilege, to 
dismiss thus that foam and froth of curls cresting 
and bubbling about your gay head like champagne, 
with the same pure glitter of pale gold—that skin 
of pearl beneath which danced little flames of rose 
fire—those eyes, bluer than anything on earth— 
blue as the skies and seas and flowers that haunt 
our dreams. Light on your feet—oh, Biddy, you, 
who soared and floated and drifted like a feather in 
the wind, like a butterfly gone mad—like a flying 
leaf and a dancing star! Had he said that you 
had a nose tilted as a flower petal, and a mouth 
that tilted, too? Had he said that when you blew 
across the dark stage that you would be arrayed in 
silver brighter than foam and white more airy than 
clouds? Had he said that you would dance not 




HER GRACE 


237 


only with those miraculous toes but with your curls 
and with your lashes and with your lips and with 
your heart? Had he said that you would come 
laughing, little Biddy? 

High on the tips of those incredible toes she 
came—nearer and nearer, so swift and light and 
sure that it seemed to Bolingham’s dazzled eyes 
that it would take less than a breath to blow her 
over that barrier of light straight into his arms— 
straight into his heart—into his tired and lonely 
heart. He leaned forward, and the vision of gold 
and silver stared back at him, faltered, tilted for¬ 
ward on her toes, and flung down to him the airy 
music of her mirth. 

“Oh, I couldn’t any more dance with you look¬ 
ing like that than I could grow feathers!” cried the 
Vision. “No, not if Saint Patrick himself were to 
bid me. Whatever in the whole world’s the mat¬ 
ter?” 

The audience stopped howling its delirious ap¬ 
proval at their Biddy’s appearance in order to revel 
in their Biddy’s chaff. No one could chaff like 
Biddy—no one nearer than Cork, at any rate. It 
was better than seeing her dance to listen to her 
laugh, gentle as a lamb, and pert as a monkey, and 
gay as a Bank Holiday. Free as air, too; if any of 
those Johnnies in the stalls tried any of their non¬ 
sense, it was a fair treat to hear her give ’em what 



238 


HER GRACE 


for! The audience stood on tiptoes and shoved 
and elbowed in riotous good humour in their efforts 
to locate her latest victim—that great black fellow 
with shoulders like a prize-fighter, likely. The 
great black fellow promptly gratified their fondest 
expectations by falling into the silver net of Biddy’s 
laughter and answering her back. 

“Thanks,” he replied distinctly. “Nothing in 
the whole world’s the matter—now.” 

“Whatever were you thinkin’ to make you scowl 
the big black ogre himself then?” 

And the Black Duke replied as clearly as 
though he were addressing the lady in the hush of 
the rose garden at Gray Courts instead of in the 
presence of the largest and most hilarious audience 
in London. 

“I was wondering how in God’s name I was 
going to get to you quickly enough to tell you what 
I was thinking before I burst with it.” 

The transfixed Gaddy tottered where he stood, 
and the audience howled unqualified approval, 
even while they waited for her to pin him to the 
wall with her reply. But Biddy only came a step 
nearer, staring down at him with the strangest 
look of wonder and delight and enchanted mis¬ 
chief. 

“Oh, whatever must you think of me, not know¬ 
ing you at all?” she cried to him over the muted 


HER GRACE 


239 


lilt of her waltz. “ ’Twas the lights in my eyes, 
maybe—or maybe the lights in yours. It’s the 
foolish creature I am anyway you put it. Would 
you be waiting for ten minutes?” 

“No,” said His Grace firmly. 

“Seven?” 

“It’ll kill me,” said His Grace. “Where will 
you be?” 

“There’s a wee door over beyond the red cur¬ 
tain,” said Biddy. “You go through that, and 
you’re in an alley as black as a pit, and you take 
three steps—no, with the legs you have you can do 
it in two with no trouble at all—and there’ll be 
another door with a fine big light over it, and I’ll 
be under the light. Don’t die.” 

“No,” said His Grace. “I won’t.” 

“Play it faster than that,” Biddy cried to her 
stupefied musicians, once more poised high on her 
silver toes. “Ah, it’s the poor, slow, thumb¬ 
fingered creatures you are, the lot of you! Play it 
fast as my Aunt Dasheen’s spotted kitten chasin’ 
its tail or I’ll dance holes in your drums for you— 
weren’t you after hearin’ that I have five minutes 
to do three great dances? It’s black-hearted 
fiends you are, with your dawdlin’ and your dith¬ 
erin’. Ah, darlin’s, come on now—spin it faster 
than that for the poor dyin’ gentleman and the 
girl that’s goin’ to save him!” 



240 HER GRACE 

\ 

And with a flash and a dip and a swirl she was 
off, and the Black Duke was off, too. Gaddy Ban- 
ford put up a feeble clamour as his guest swept by 
him toward the aisle. 

“Oh, but my dear fellow—no, but I say, wait a 
bit—she’s simply chaffing you, you know; she’ll 
never in the world be there for a minute-” 

“Hand over my stick, will you?” inquired the 
duke affably. “You’ve no earthly use for two. 
And don’t come trotting along after me, either. 
She’s not expecting you , you know—rather not.” 
He swung buoyantly off toward the red curtain, 
bestowing a benign nod on the now deliriously di¬ 
verted audience. 

“Take a chair along, matey!” “Want a 
mornin’ paper? Come in ’andy to pass away the 
time!” “Fetch ’im ’is tea at nine, Bertie—’e’ll 
need it bad.” “Don’t you wait for her no more 
than twenty-four hours, ole dear—promise us that, 
now-” 

“Bolingham, I say-” panted the unfortunate 

Gaddy. “I say, someone must have tipped her 
off, you know!” 

“Tipped her off?” 

“Told her who you were, you know?” 

The duke laughed aloud and Gaddy Banford, 
who had never heard him do this, jumped badly. 

“D’you know what I’ve been wondering, 






HER GRACE 


241 


Gaddy? I’ve been wondering how the deuce I was 
going to own up to her—a duke’s such a damn potty 
thing, when you come down to it. Why the devil 
didn’t someone make me Emperor of Russia?” 

He brushed aside the red curtain, grinned once 
more into Banford’s stunned countenance, and 
passed with one great stride through the door into 
the black alley. The door swung to behind him, 
and he stood leaning against it for a minute, 
savouring the wonder and the mag'c that he had 
fallen heir to. There was a drift of music in the 
alley—the sky was powdered thick with stars— 
the air was sweet as flowers against his face. He 
drew a deep breath, and turned his head; and 
there she stood beneath the light, with a black 
scarf over her golden head and a black cloak over 
her silver dress—and it took him two strides to 
reach her, as she had said. She had one hand to 
her heart and was breathing quickly in little light 
gasps, as though she had come running. 

“Were you waitin’ long?” she asked. “I never 
stopped at all to change a stitch and dear knows 
’twas a sin how I cheated on that last one—no more 
than a flout and a spin, and not that maybe; only 
I was afraid for my soul you’d be gone. Was it 
long you waited?” 

“Forty-two years,” said His Grace. “Forty- 
two years and three days.” 



242 


HER GRACE 


He watched the rose flood up to her lashes at 
that, but the joyous eyes never swerved from 
his. 

“Ah, well,” she murmured, “I waited seventeen 
my own self, and I not half the size of you—no 
higher than your pocket, if you come to look. I 
can’t think at all what you’ve been doing with 
yourself all that time.” 

“Don’t think—ever,” he said. “I’ve done 
nothing worth a moment’s thought but miss you.” 

“Have you missed me then, truly?” she whis¬ 
pered. “Oh, it’s from farther than Cork I’d come 
to hear you say that; I’d come from Heaven itself, 
may the Saints there forgive me. Say it again, 
quick!” 

“I’ve missed you since the day I drew breath,” 
he told her, and his voice shook. “Every day that 
I’ve lived has been black and bare and cold with¬ 
out you—blackest because I never knew I’d find 
you. Biddy, is it true? Things don’t happen like 
this, do they? No one out of a dream ever had 
such hair—no one out of a fairy tale such eyes! 
Biddy, would you laugh like that if it were a 
dream?” 

“I would that,” she remarked with decision. 
“It’s a fine dream and a grand fairy tale and the 
truest truth you ever heard in your life. I knew 
’twas you even when you were scowlin’, but those 




HER GRACE 243 

lights were in my eyes, so I couldn’t be sure till you 
smiled.” 

“Biddy, how did you know?” 

She pushed the scarf back from those golden 
bubbles with a gay gesture of impatience. 

“Well, why wouldn’t I know? That’s a queer 
way to talk to a bright girl! Didn’t my own Aunt 
Dasheen, she that was all the family I had till I 
ran off and took London for one, tell me that I’d 
be the grandest dancer that ever leapt, and marry 
the finest gentleman that ever walked, as big as a 
giant and black as a devil and handsome as a king? 
And she ought to know, surely, what with reading 
in tea and clear water as quick as you and me in 
the Good Book. It was the wicked, cunning old 
thing she was, God rest her soul.” 

“Is she dead?” 

“She is that,” replied Aunt Dasheen’s niece 
cheerfully. “Or I’d never be here to tell it. 
She kept tight hold of me as if I were a bit of gold, 
for all that she sorrowed and sang how I was more 
trouble to her than any monkey from Egypt. If 
Tim Murphy and his brothers hadn’t been coming 
to show the Londoners how to juggle glass balls 
and brought me along to hold the things, I’d be 
in the wee room tending the fire and the kitten this 
minute, instead of standing under a light in a sil¬ 
ver dress with my heart in my hands.” 


244 


HER GRACE 


“I wish I could thank her,” said the duke. 

“It’s little enough you have to thank her for,” 
replied his Biddy blithely. “She was crosser than 
most and cooler than any, God help her. ’Twas 
that spotted kitten she loved; if she hadn’t seen 
the bit about me in the tea, she’d have dropped me 
straight out of the window. But there was my 
grand gentleman and the rest of it to give her 

patience. ‘Wed at seventeen, dead at- 

She caught back the words as deftly as Tim 
Murphy’s glass balls, with a triumphant shake of 
her curls. “‘Death to your dancing,’ she’d keep 
saying. You could thank her for that, maybe—or 
perhaps ’twas because I danced you stopped 
scowling, and you’ll not want me to leave off?” 

“Biddy, it’s true then—you’re only seventeen?” 
His voice was touched with a strange pain and 
wonder. 

“Hear him, now—only, indeed! I’m seventeen 
the day.” 

“And I past forty-two!” 

“Are you no more than that?” she asked softly. 
“However in all the world could you get so great 
and grand and fine in that little while?” 

“Oh,” he cried. “Does laughter take the sting 
from all that’s ugly? Laugh again then; there’s 
worse still. Lord help us, darling—I’m a duke!” 

“Is that all?” she inquired regretfully. “I’d 




HER GRACE 


245 


have thought a king at the least. Well, come, 
there’s no helping it—’tis not all of us get our 
deserts in this wicked world.” 

“Biddy,” he begged. “Laugh at this, too, will 
you? Try, try, dear, before it hurts us. I have 
three sons, Biddy. I’ve been married before.” 

She put her other hand to her heart at that, but 
she kept her lips curved. 

“It’s small wonder,” she said. “Why wouldn’t 
you have been? I’m the shameless one to say it, 
but if I’d been ten girls instead of one, it’s ten 
times you’d have been married.” 

He put his arms about her then, and something 
broke in his heart—something cold and hard and 
bitter. He wanted to tell her that, but he could 
find no words, because he was only a duke, and not 
a very articulate one at that. But the small 
shining creature in his arms had words enough for 
two. 

“Were you thinking of wedding again, maybe?” 

“Oh, Biddy,” he cried, “let’s hurry!” 

“If you’re asking me,” she said, “I’d say we 
were hurrying fast and free. I can hear the air 
whistlin’ in my ears, I can that. Was she a fine 
lady, darling?” 

“Who?” he asked—and remembered—and for¬ 
got her for all time. “ Oh, she was a very fine lady, 
and good, and gentle, too. She died long ago.” 


246 


HER GRACE 


“Did she, poor thing?” whispered the future 
Duchess of Bolingham softly, the cloud in the blue, 
blue eyes gone for ever. “And me no good at all. 
I wonder at you! Are they little young things, 
your sons?” 

“The smallest’s big enough to put you in his 
pocket,” he said. “Biddy, let’s hurry. I know 
an Archbishop that we could have fix it to-night— 
I know two, if it comes to that. One of ’em was 
my godfather.” 

“Well, you could know six, and ’twould be all 
the good it would do you,” commented his Biddy 
serenely. “I know one old priest, and his name’s 
Father Leary, and ’twill be a bitter grief to him, 
but he may do it, since he’s one of the Saints them¬ 
selves and terrible fond of a bad girl. Archbishop, 
indeed! ” 

“Let’s find him, then, and tell him. I’ll-” 

“We’ll not, then. He’s a poor old man that 
needs his sleep, and we’re two mad things that 
should know better. See the stars, darlin’; they’re 
the cool little things. We must do nothing in 
haste, except leave this door, maybe. The whole 
lot of them will be out on us like a lot of ravening 
wolves any minute. Wherever can we go?” 

“We can go and get married,” said the Duke of 
Bolingham, who was a simple and determined 
individual. “I’ll get-” 




HER GRACE 


247 


“You might get a hansom-” Biddy danced 

in rapture on the tips of her toes. “You might get 
that one there, and we could ride a hundred miles 
or so, and watch how cool the stars are. I never 
was long enough in one in my life to get over feeling 
sad that soon it would stop, an’ I’d have to be off 
and out. Would you get one—would you?” 

The duke raised his hand to the hansom, and 
it crawled toward them dubiously. The small 
dancing creature on the pavement looked frankly 
incredible, both to the horse and the driver, but 
the large black one looked as though it knew its 
mind. The two of them got in quickly, and the 
small one tilted back her shining head against the 
great one’s shoulder, sighing rapturously, while the 
black cloak fell open, and her skirts frothed about 
her in a manner scandalous to behold. 

“Where to?” inquired the cabby with severity. 

“Oh, what matter at all where to?” cried the 
incredible small one. “A hundred miles or so any 
way at all, just so we can see those stars go out; 
they’re that cool and calm it’s an aggravation.” 

“Drive straight ahead—a hundred miles,” said 
the great one in so terrifying a tone that the cabby 
gave one sharp pant and started on his pilgrimage. 
Roaring drunk or plain barmy, the large occupant 
of the cab was all too plainly one to be humoured. 

“Would a hundred miles bring us to dawn?” 




248 


HER GRACE 


inquired the smaller lunatic. “Oh, I’d rather a 
dawn than a parade any day there is, though 
sleeping’s a grand thing, too.” 

“ When will you marry me?” demanded the duke. 

“We must be that wise and cool we’ll put the 
stars to shame,” she said dreamily. “How many 
days would there be in a year? I’ve no head for 
figures at all.” 

“A year?” protested the stricken duke fiercely. 
“Three hundred and sixty-five days? You 
couldn’t—you couldn’t-” 

Biddy raised her hand to the silver laces 
above her heart with the strangest little look of 
wonder. 

“Three hundred and sixty-five?” she whispered. 
“No more than that? No more than that—for 
sure?” 

“Nomore?” he cried. “Why, it’s a lifetime— 
it’s eternity-” 

“ Ah, and so it is,” said his Biddy. “ Well, then, 
let’s be wise as the stars—and wait till morning. 
Father Leary, he’s an old man, and he wakes at 
dawn; ’tis himself that says so. He’ll marry us 
then if I have to do penance for the rest of my days. 
Three hundred and sixty-five, you say? You’re 
right—oh, you’re right. ’Tis a lifetime!” 

And so at dawn Biddy O’Rourke became the 
Duchess of Bolingham, and the greatest scandal of 




HER GRACE 


249 


the century broke over a waking city. Things 
like that don’t happen, you say—no, things like 
that don’t happen, except in real life or in fairy 
tales. But if you had asked the duke or his 
duchess, they could have told you that this was 
real life—and a fairy tale. 

They drove down to Gray Courts behind a pair 
of bright bays called Castor and Pollux that same 
day, in a high trap of black and scarlet, with fawn- 
coloured cushions. The duke drove, and the 
duchess sat perched beside him in a great red 
postillion’s coat from Redfern with a ruby ring as 
big as the Pope’s on her finger and a hat no larger 
than a poppy tilted over one eye. It had a little 
red feather in it that wagged violently every time 
the bays lifted a foot, and Her Grace’s tongue 
wagged more violently than the feather. 

“Is it a castle you live in, darlin’P” 

“It’ll be a castle once you’re in it. Who ever 
heard of a Princess that didn’t live in a castle? '’ 

“Is it terrible big and black and grand, like 
you?” 

“Terrible—you couldn’t tell us apart.” 

“Do your great sons live there all by them¬ 
selves?” 

“Oh,rather not. They live there with two tu¬ 
tors and a trainer and an old nurse and four aunts, 
besides all the hounds and horses and grooms 




250 HER GRACE 

and jockeys and farriers that they can wedge into 
the stables.” 

“The Saints keep us!” invoked Biddy with 
heartfelt piety. “Was it four aunts you said?” 

“Oh, God forgive me, I clean forgot ’em!” 
The duke’s cry was quite as heartfelt, but it lacked 
piety. “No, I swear that’s the truth. I sent a 
messenger down this morning with a letter for 
Noll, but not one of the lot of them entered my 
head—Biddy, Biddy, if I’d remembered, I’d have 
taken you somewhere else.” 

“Ah, well, it can’t be helped, darlin’. It’s glad 
news and golden that I’ve driven the thought of four 
grand ladies clear out of your head, and it’s small 
fault of yours that so much as a whisper of the word 
aunt makes the soles of my feet grow cold and the 
hairs of my head rise up on end. If you’d known 
my father’s sister Dasheen you’d never wonder! 
Maybe the four of these are nice old bodies?” 

“And maybe they’re not!” remarked the duke. 
“Gad, but I’d give a thousand pound to have them 
hear you calling them nice old bodies. Clarissa, 
now-” 

He gave such a shout of laughter that the off bay 
swerved and Biddy had to clutch at his sleeve to 
keep from falling. 

“Are they just young aunts then?” she inquired 
hopefully. 



HER GRACE 


251 


The duke let the bays fend for themselves while 
he kissed the ridiculous hand and the dancing 
feather and both of the small corners of her smile. 

“Beautiful, wait till you see them! They’re 
not aunts at all. Heaven help us—they’re sisters! 
One of their noses would make four of yours, and 
every last one of them is more like Queen Elizabeth 
in her prime than any one going around England 
these days. They have fine bones and high heads 
and eyes like ripe hearts of icicles and tongues like 
serpents’ tails dipped in vinegar.” 

“Have they now!” remarked Her Grace pen¬ 
sively. “Well, ’twill not be dull at Gray Courts, I 
can tell that from here. Was Elizabeth the cross 
heathen that snipped the head off the pretty light 
one home from France?” 

“I wish I’d had your history teacher,” said the 
duke with emphasis. “I spent years on end learn¬ 
ing less about the ladies that you’ve put in a dozen 
words. I shouldn’t wonder if cross heathens 
described the lot as well as anything else. I was a 
cross heathen myself till half-past nine last night.” 

“Never say it!” cried his Biddy. “You’ve a 
heart of gold and a tongue of silver, and I’m the 
girl that knows. ’Tis likely they’ll love me no 
better than the cross one loved the pretty one, 
then?” 

“ ’Tis likely they’ll love you less,” prophesied the 


252 , HER GRACE 

duke accurately, “since they can’t snip off your 
head!” 

Biddy’s laughter was a flight of silver birds. 

“Then since it’s sorrow we’re goin’ to,” she 
begged, “let’s go easy. Make the horses step soft 
and slow, darlin’; ’tis the prettiest evening in all 
the world, and I’m that high up I can see clear over 
the great green hedges into the wee green gardens. 
I doubt if it’ll smell any better in Heaven!” 

“I doubt if it’ll smell half as sweet,” he said. 
“If we go slow we’ll miss our dinner.” 

“Ah, let’s miss our dinner!” she begged. “Did 
we not eat all those little fat quail and those great 
fat peaches for our lunch? I’d rather sup on the 
lights that’ll be coming out behind the window- 
panes while we pass, and the stars that’ll slip 
through the sky while we’re not looking, and the 
smell of gilly-flowers and lavender warm against 
the walls. Maybe if we go slow, we might have a 
slip of new moon for dessert—maybe if we go 
slower than that, the horses will know what it’s 
all about, and let you hold one of my hands.” 

And so the horses did, and so he did, and it was 
long past dinner when the duke and his duchess 
drove through the gates of Gray Courts, and swept 
proudly up the long alley with its great beech 
trees to the door where grooms and butlers and 
housekeepers and maids and men enough to start a 


HER GRACE 


253 


republic came running sedately to greet them. 
The duke stood them off with a gesture and held 
out both his hands to help his duchess down from 
her throne, and she laid her finger-tips in his and 
reached the threshold high on her toes. 

“ This,” said the duke with a pride that made his 
former arrogance seem humility, “is Her Grace.” 

He swung her through the carved doors before 
the most skillful of them could do more than gape 
or sketch a curtsey—in the great stone hall with 
the flagged floor and the two fireplaces built by 
giants to burn oak trees she looked smaller than a 
child and brighter than a candle. She stood smil¬ 
ing as warmly at the cold and hollow suits of ar¬ 
mour, with their chilled gleam of steel and gold and 
silver and the jaded plumes drooping in their hel¬ 
mets, as though they were her brothers, and the 
dun-coloured hound lying with his nose on his paws 
blinked twice, and rose slowly, in his huge grace, 
and strolled to where she stood gleaming, thrusting 
his great head beneath her hand. 

“Oh, the wonder he is!” she cried. “What will 
I call him?” 

“His name’s Merlin,” the duke told her, and he 
put his arm about her in full sight of the stunned 
household. “He knows a witch as well as the 
one he was named for. Layton, where are my 
sisters?” 


254 


HER GRACE 


“Their Ladyships have retired to their rooms, 
Your Grace/ 5 

“ Good! ” replied His Grace distinctly. “ Where 
are my sons? ” 

“Their Lordships drove over late this after¬ 
noon for a dinner and theatricals at the Marquis of 
Dene’s, Your Grace.” 

“Better!” said His Grace. “Then shall we go 
to our room, Biddy? We’ve not eaten; send some 
claret and fruit and cold fowl—what else, Biddy?” 

“Some little cakes stuffed full with raisins, if 
there’re any about,” suggested Her Grace hope¬ 
fully. 

“Cakes,” commanded the Duke of Bolingham 
in a voice that would have raised cakes from the 
stone flags. “Will you have a maid, Biddy?” 

“Whatever for?” inquired Biddy with candid 
interest. “I’ve still the use of all ten of my fingers, 
and you’d be there to help if I broke one, wouldn’t 
you?” 

es,” said the duke, his arm closing faster 
about her, his voice shaken. “No maid. Is the 
room ready, Layton?” 

“Quite ready, Your Grace.” Layton seized the 
great black dressing-case with the gold locks and 
the little snakeskin jewel case that Biddy had 
pounced on in Bond Street that morning, and 
James swung up the huge pigskin bags of His 


TIER GRACE 


255 


Grace, and Potter appeared from somewhere with 
fruit and wine, and Durkin from nowhere with a 
silver basket of small cakes, and a very young 
gentleman called Tunbridge appeared with candles 
that were larger than he. The duke and the 
duchess followed this procession up the dark 
splendour of the stairs, with Merlin padding su¬ 
perbly behind his witch. When they reached the 
landing the procession swung to the right. 

“Here!” called Bolingham. “Which room?” 

“The Damask Room, Your Grace.” 

“No,” said His Grace. “No.” He did not 
raise his voice, but his fingers crushed down des¬ 
perately on the light ones lying in his. “We’ll 
use the Blue Room.” 

The agitated voice of the housekeeper cried, 
“Oh, Your Grace, it’s not ready!” 

“Make it ready—flowers, candles, linen. Be 
quick.” 

They were quick. Feet ran, hands flew, while 
the duke and his duchess stood waiting in the room 
in which a king had slept and a prince had died, 
and which for a hundred years had stood empty of 
life, save when some awed visitor tiptoed across the 
threshold, marvelling at its more than royal beauty 
—its walls stretched with velvet blue and deep as 
night, its painted beams, its hooded fireplace, its 
great bed around which the velvet curtains swept. 


256 


HER GRACE 


brave with their golden Tudor roses; quick hands 
now brought other roses, wine-red in silver bowls, 
to sweeten the air, and sticks of wood to light a fire 
to warm it, for even August turned chilly in that 
magnificence; they spread a gay feast before the 
flames and fine linen on the bed; they brought high 
candelabra wrought of silver, more of them and 
more of them, until the shadows wavered and 
danced, and the new duchess clapped her hands 
and danced, too. 

“That enough?” the duke asked her. 

“Oh, ’tis enough to light the way from here to 
the pole! I’d not have said there were so many 
candles in all the world.” 

“Right,” said the duke to his servitors briefly. 
“That’s all, then. Good-night.” 

And the quick hands and the quick feet were 
gone, and the duke was left alone with his 
duchess. 

“It’s not too cold?” he asked. 

“No, no!” she said. “It’s fine and warm.” 

“It’s not too dark?” 

“No, no—it’s fine and bright!” 

“My little heart, you don’t hate it? You’re not 
afraid?” 

“Afraid?” cried his heart, alight with laughter. 
“Afraid with you by me? Am I mad?” 

He knelt at that and put his arms about her. 


HER GRACE 257 

Even kneeling his black head was higher than her 
bright one. 

‘"It’s I who am afraid. Biddy, what if I made 
you stop smiling? Biddy, Biddy, don’t ever stop 
smiling!” 

“Never fear! ” she cried. “Never fear, my dear 

love. I’ll never in this world stop smiling-” 

She caught her breath, and shook her curls, and 
laid her laughing lips gayly and bravely against his. 
“Nor in the next one, either!” said Her Grace. 

She kept her word. That shining mischief of 
hers never wavered—nothing touched it, not the 
frozen hatred of the four outraged ladies or the 
surly insolence of the three dark boys, or the in¬ 
different disdain of the county neighbours, or the 
blank indignation of the court. He watched over 
her with terror and rage in his heart; they, they to 
scorn his miracle! 

That first dinner, with the ladies Pamela, 
Clarissa, Maude, and Charlotte, looking down their 
high noses at the radiant intruder, pouring out 
venom, poison, and vinegar as freely as wine- 

“Say the word,” he told her through his teeth, 
safe in the sanctuary of their dark and beautiful 
room, “and the four of them shall walk to Lon¬ 
don!” 

“ Well, if they crawled there, ’twould be no more 
than they deserve!” said Her Grace with decision. 




258 


HER GRACE 


“The cross faces they have, and the mean tongues! 
They’d wear the patience out of a Saint.” 

“They can start packing now!” he cried, and 
made for the door. 

“No, no!” Her laughter checked him like a 
hand. “What does it matter at all, since I’m no 
Saint? I’ll not need patience; all I’ll need is grace 
to keep a straight face and a civil tongue. Let 
them be, darlin’; ’tis a thousand pities my Aunt 
Dasheen died without laying eyes on them. 
They’re like her own sisters. Did no one ever give 
that fine Roddy of yours a good cuff?” 

“I’ll give him two and a strapping,” said the 
duke. “ The glowering young cub! ” 

“You’d never steal such pleasure for yourself,” 
she implored. “In no time at all they’ll be gone 
to their schools and colleges, and I’ll set what mind 
I have to growing tall enough to reach their ears 
if I stand on my toes. Would you like me better 
if I reached up higher?” 

Their world was in that room—its four blue 
walls held all their heaven and earth. From its 
windows they saw dawns break and nights fall; 
when they crossed its threshold they stepped under 
a spell that held them safe from all disaster. No one 
had ever loved any one as he loved his little golden 
duchess; sometimes he smiled gravely and indul¬ 
gently when he thought of the poor travesties that 


HER GRACE 


259 


passed in the world for adoration. Dante and the 
girl that crossed the bridge in her wine-coloured 
gown—tragic and absurd to call that love, which 
was not strong enough to win a kiss! Paolo and 
Francesca stealing hot glances over a closed book 
in a garden—blasphemous to think that love could 
come clothed in secrecy and guilt. And those 
frantic, desperate children of the Capulets and 
Montagues—was love, then, something shot with 
blood and tears? No, no, love was shot with 
beauty and with mirth—love was his Biddy, 
dancing through darkness to his arms. 

When some unshirkable duty called him from her 
to the London that they had forgotten he would 
possess his soul with what patience he might until 
the doors of Gray Courts opened once more, and 
before the dcors had swung to behind his voice 
would ring out— 

“Where is Her Grace?” 

They never had need to tell him; before the 
words were off his lips he would hear her light feet, 
running to reach him across the long halls, the 
dark stairs. 

When winter hung the world in silver frost they 
piled the fire higher and drew the curtains closer 
and sat wrapped warm in dreaming happiness 
while the winds roared and lashed over the 
world. 


260 


HER GRACE 


“Shall I take you to London?'’ he asked her. 

“London?” she cried in wonder. “Oh, what¬ 
ever for?” 

“You’re not dull here? You’re not lonely?” 

“Dull? With you? Lonely—lonely with 

you?” 

After awhile she lifted her head and locked her 
fingers fast in his, and asked, 

“When is your birthday?” 

“In July—the twenty-fifth. Why?” 

“I’ll have a grand present for you,” said Her 
Grace. “A baby. A baby that’ll have a yellow 
head and a twinkle in both his eyes. A baby 
that’ll grow tall enough to thrash the wickedness 
out of his black brothers and have sense enough to 
laugh instead of doing it.” 

He bowed his head over the linked fingers. 

“Biddy, what more will you give me, you who 
have given me all the world?” 

“’Tis a small thing,” she whispered. “July. 
That will be a year since you came to see me 
dance?” 

“A year, my heart.” 

“How many days are there in a year, did you 
say?” 

“Three hundred and sixty-five.” 

“A day—a day is a poor short thing,” said Her 
Grace. “If I had a wish, I’d wish them longer. 


HER GRACE 


261 


Tis cold in here, with the wind roaring down the 
chimney. Hold me closer—hold me fast.” 

And with spring her wish was granted, and the 
days were longer; not long enough to hold the joy 
they poured into them—but filled to the brim with 
pale sunlight and primroses and hawthorn hedges. 
And it was June, and they were longer still, flood¬ 
ed with golden warmth and the smell of yellow 
roses and life and magic, and the taste of honey. 
And it was July, and it was his birthday—and the 
world stood still. 

Her Grace gave him the yellow-headed baby for 
a birthday present. When they brought him his 
son he looked at him with strange eyes and turned 
his face away and asked them in a voice that none 
would have known, 

“How is she now?” 

The great doctors who had come hurrying from 
London shook their heads, and were grave and 
pompous and learned. 

“Bad. Her heart was in a shocking condition 
—she had not told you?” 

No—no, she had not told him. 

“Well, we must hope; we must hope.” 

But soon they could no longer hope; soon hope 
was gone. For all their dignity, for all their 
learning, they could only give her drugs to make 
it easier to die; they could only prop her up against 


262 


HER GRACE 


the pillows in the great Tudor bed, and smooth 
the dark coverlet, and tiptoe from the room, 
leaving her to her duke. She sat there still and 
small, her hands on his black head where he knelt 
beside her, with so little breath left to tell him of 
her love that she sought the shortest words, she 
who had been a spendthrift of them. 

“Darlin’.” He did not stir, even at that. 
“Never grieve. I’ve known it a great while; they 
told me in London before you came that ’twould 
be no more than a year. And my Aunt Dasheen, 
she was wise before they. 4 Wed at seventeen, dead 
at eighteen’-” 

“Biddy,” he whispered, “I've killed you—I’ve 
killed you.” 

“Oh, what talk is this? You, who gave me my 
life? I never minded the dying—’twas only when 
I thought how lonely it would be, with no one 
caring whether I came or went. I’ve forgotten 
what loneliness is with you by me. Look up at 
me.” 

He raised his head—and her eyes were dancing. 

“Has it yellow hair?” 

“Yes.” 

“Will you teach it to laugh?” 

“Biddy—Biddy-” 

“’Twill be dull in Heaven without you,” she 
said. “But ’twill be gay when you come.” She 




HER GRACE 


263 


leaned toward him, her lips curved to mischief. 
“Wait till they tell my Aunt Dasheen—Saint 
Peter himself will have to laugh. ‘Woman, there’s 
someone just come asking after you—a little one, 
even on her toes. She says her name is Biddy and 

she’s Duchess of Bolingham- 

The faint voice trailed to airy mirth, and with 
that music echoing still about her Her Grace 
closed her dancing eyes, and closed her laughing 
lips, and turned her bright head away and was 
gone, as lightly and swiftly as she had come. 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 



OU actually mean to tell me that you don’t 


want to get out of this dripping hole?” 
“My dear old ass, why on earth should 


I want to get out of it? ” 

Anthony Christopher Stoningham Calvert faced 
the incredulous glare of the freckle-faced young 
gentleman from Ohio with engaging candour. 
Four years of soaking in tropical pest holes 
and rioting from Monte Carlo to Rio, from 
Shanghai to Singapore, since they had met, 
and yet there he sat, sprawled out full length 
in his great cane chair, as cool and shameless and 
unconquerably youthful as though he had just 
been sent down from Oxford for the first time. 
Even in the light that filtered in through the cane 
shutters, green and strange as the pallid glow that 
washes through aquariums, it was clear that time 
had found no power to touch that long grace, that 
bright head with its ruffled crop of short hair, those 
gay eyes, wide set and mischievous in the brown 
young face, those absurd dimples, carved deep into 
the lean curve of the cheek. Young Ledyard 


264 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


265 


gave a bark of outraged protest, his pleasant face 
flushed and exasperated under its thatch of sandy 
hair. 

“You mean it? You aren’t coming back with 
me?” 

“Not for all the gold in the Indies, my dear kid 
—or out of them either, if it conies to that.” The 
Honourable Tony, as he had been dubbed by a 
scandalized and diverted public, grinned alluringly 
through the vaguely sinister light at his onetime 
comrade at arms. “The whole thing is absolutely 
ripping, I tell you, and the only thing that I ask 
is to spend the next sixty years doing precisely 
what I’m doing now.” 

“I don’t believe you,” rejoined his baffled guest 
flatly. “Why in God’s name should you want to 
rot your life away in a little backwater Hell, when 
I can give you a first-rate job twenty-four hours 
after we land in America?” 

“But, my dear fellow, I wouldn’t have your job 
as a birthday gift. You may be the heir apparent 
to the greatest rubber business in the whole jolly 
globe, but try to bear in mind that you see before 
you the chief, sole, and official British Imperial 
Adviser to the fattest little Sultan in Asia—who 
incidentally eats up every word of wisdom that 
falls from his adviser’s lips and sits up and begs 
for more, let me tell you.” 


266 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


“And let me tell you that it’s common gossip in 
every gutter in Singapore that your Sultan’s a 
black-hearted scoundrel who’s only waiting for a 
chance to double-cross England and do you one in 
the eye.” 

“What happens to be the current gutter gossip 
about his adviser?” inquired that gentleman 
blandly. 

Ledyard’s jaw looked suddenly aggressive. 

“Never mind what it happens to be. What I 
want to know is why your friend Bhakdi isn’t back 
in his dirty little capital trying to straighten out 
some of the messes he’s got himself into instead of 
squatting up here in the jungle hunting tigers?” 

“Because his invaluable adviser advises him to 
stay precisely where he is,” explained the Hon¬ 
ourable Tony cheerfully. “Just between us, there 
are several nasty bits of international complica¬ 
tions and one or two strictly domestic ones that 
make a protracted absence from the native heath 
highly advisable—oh, highly. Besides, you’d 
hardly have us trot back without a tiger, would 
you? I assure you that so far we haven’t bagged a 
solitary one. Not a tiger, Bill, not a tiger!” 

“Oh, for the love of the Lord, shut up! I tell 
you this whole thing’s a rotten, ugly, dangerous 
business, and I didn’t come crawling up through 
Hades to have you turn it into a joke. I can’t 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


267 


stay jawing about it, and you know it—it’s going 
to be a darned close squeak to make connections 
with the steamer as it is. Are you coming or arc 
you not?” 

“I are not. Do quiet down and tell me why it 
is that you’re totally unable to distinguish between 
comic opera and melodrama? This whole per¬ 
formance is the purest farce, I swear! Wait till 
you see his Imperial Majesty—as nice a buttery, 
pompous little blighter as you’d want to lay eyes 
on, who’s spent six months at Cambridge and 
comes to heel like a spaniel if you tell him that 
anything in the world ‘isn’t done.’ He has a solid 
gold bicycle and four unhappy marriages and a 
body-guard with bright green panties and mother- 
of-pearl handles to their automatics! You 
wouldn’t expect even a Chinaman to take that 
seriously, would you?” 

“I should think you’d go mad in your head try¬ 
ing to get along with a bounder who doesn’t know 
the first thing in the world about your code of 
standards or-” 

“William, you are the most frightful donkey! 
The only code that I’ve recognized since I pat¬ 
tered off the ancestral estate is the jolly dot-dash 
thing that they use for telegrams. I’ve finally got 
our Bhakdi to the point where he drills his troops 
in pure British and plays a cracking good game of 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


268 

auction bridge without cheating—civilization’s 
greatest triumph in the Near or Far East. Per¬ 
sonally, I ask no more of it!” 

Ledyard mopped his brow despairingly. The 
dim room with its snowy matting and pale green 
cushions looked cool enough, but the heat outside 
would have penetrated a refrigerator. Just the 
other side of those protecting shutters the sun was 
beating down on the quiet waters until they glared 
back like burning silver—the tufts of palm and 
bamboo were hanging like so many dejected jade 
banners in the breathless air—the ridiculous little 
houses were huddled clumsily together on their 
ungainly piles, shrinking unhappily under their 
huge hats of nippa thatch. 

“It’s a filthy, poisonous hole!” he protested 
fiercely. “It beats me why you can’t see it. If 
anything went wrong here, you wouldn’t have a 
white man in a hundred miles to turn to. You 
needn’t laugh. There’s nothing so howlingly 
funny about it. What about that Scotch engineer 
who was so everlastingly intimate with your 
precious Bhakdi’s next-door neighbour?” 

“Well, what about him? The poor chap fell 
down a shaft and broke his neck.” 

“Oh, he did, did he? Well, believe me, that’s 
not what they say in Singapore! Calvert, for 
God’s sake , get out of this infernal place. Every 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 269 

inch of it smells of death and damnation. How 
any one who calls himself an English gentleman can 
stick it for a minute-” 

“But I don’t call myself an English gentleman,” 
the Honourable Tony assured him earnestly. 
“God forbid! I call myself an out-and-out waster 
exiled for ever from the Mother Country by a cruel 
and powerful elder brother. The only trick in it 
is that I’m simply cuckoo with ecstasy over the 
entire situation. Not according to Kipling, what? 
No, the glittering prospect of spending the re¬ 
maining years of a misspent life in the largest 
rubber factory in Ohio leaves me considerably 
colder than ice.” 

“I suggested Ohio because I happen to be in 
charge of that plant myself,” returned Ledyard 
stiffly. “If you’d rather have a go at one of the 
others-” 

“But, my good child, it seems impossible to 
make you understand that the factory has not 
been built for which I would exchange one single 
baked banana soaked in rum and moonlight. 
Think of the simply hideous sacrifices that I’d 
make, can’t you?—taking advice instead of being 
paid good round guineas for giving it—working 
for one beastly hour after another instead of slip¬ 
ping from one golden minute to the next—drink¬ 
ing nasty chemical messes in constant terror of 





£70 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


sudden death or prison bars, instead of tossing off 
bumpers and flagons and buckets of delectable 
fluids that smell like flowers and shine like jewels— 
dragging around to the most appalling festivals 
where pampered little females tip up their ridicu¬ 
lous powdered noses and distribute two minutes 
of their precious dances as though they were con¬ 
ferring the Order of the Garter, instead of-” 

Ledyard looked suddenly three shades hotter 
beneath his freckles. 

“Thanks—glad to know T how much you enjoyed 
your visit.” 

“I enjoyed every minute of it to the point of 
explosion, as you are thoroughly well aware. If I 
live to ninety-two, I shall remember the excellent 
yarns that your father spun over those incredibly 
good cigars and that simply immortal corn pud¬ 
ding, and the shoulders on the little red-headed 
creature in the black dress at the Country Club— 
good Lord, William, the shoulders on that creature! 
After four years of not especially pretty smells and 
not especially pretty noises, what do you think that 
those July evenings under the awnings on your 
veranda meant to a God-forsaken flying chap 
back from the wars, William?” 

William looked frankly unappeased. 

“A hell of a lot of difference it makes what I 
think! I know one God-forsaken flying chap who 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


271 


thought it wasn’t good enough for him, by a long 
shot. Not. while he could hop off and rot his soul 
out in a water-logged bamboo shack in Asia!” 

The owner of the bamboo shack settled deeper 
into his chair with a graceless and engaging grin. 

“My dear chap, it was Heaven, pure and simple 
—but a dash too pure and simple for some of us. 
Every man his own Heaven, what? Well, you’re 
sitting in mine at the present. Of course it 
mightn’t suit any one with even an elementary code 
of principles, but having none of any kind or 
description it suits me down to the ground and up 
to the sky.” 

“Oh, bunk!” commented Ledyard with fervent 
irritation. “You’ve got all the principles you 
need; do you think that I’d have come chasing up 
this unspeakable river in everything from a motor- 
boat to a raft after any howling blackguard?” 

“Well, it’s rather one on you, isn’t it, dear boy? 
Because it’s so absolutely what you’ve up and gone 
and done—though through no earthly fault of 
mine, you know! Rather not. Didn’t I spend 
four jolly busy years trying to get it through your 
thick skull that I was ninety-nine different varie¬ 
ties of blighter, and that nice little American kids 
with freckles on their noses shouldn’t come trotting 
around my propellers? ” 

“Hey, how do you get that way?” The nice 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


little American kid raised his voice in poignant 
irritation. “Kid! If any one ever took the trou¬ 
ble to give you two looks they’d think you’d 
bounced straight out of rompers into long trousers 
without waiting for knickerbockers. Kid!” 

“Old in iniquity, William, old in iniquity,” ex¬ 
plained the Honourable Tony blithely. “Physi¬ 
cally I grant that I’m fairly in the pink, but morally 
I’m edging rapidly into senile decay. I pledge 
you my word, which is worth considerably less 
than nothing, that I haven’t as many morals as I 
have side whiskers. And even you, my dear old 
chap, will be willing to admit that I don’t go in 
heavily for side whiskers. Take a long piercing 
look.” 

Ledyard scowled wretchedly at the impish 
countenance blandly presented for inspection. 

“ The trouble with you is that you simply can’t 
take it in that any one on the whole bally globe 
could prefer a Bengal tiger to a British lion and a 
bird of paradise to an American eagle. You see 
before you a foul monstrosity who would trade all 
the British Isles for twenty yards of jungle, and 
gloat over his bargain. Have a cigarette?” 

“No, I won’t have a cigarette. You make me 
so sick and tired with all that jaw about what a 
devil you are that I could yell. Once and for all, 
are you going to drop it and come back with me?” 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


273 


“Once and for all I am not going to move one 
quarter of an inch. Stop jawing yourself for a 
minute, and try to see it my way. If you’d been 
chivvied about for your entire life by a lot of 
frenzied vestals for aunts who were trying to guide 
you to what they unfortunately considered grace, 
and three simply appalling bounders for brothers 
who set up the most frightful howl over the Boling- 
ham name and the Bolingham honour and the 
Bolingham fortune every time the youngest mem¬ 
ber of the Bolingham family picked a primrose, 
you’d good and well think you were in Heaven if 
you could get out of earshot of their ghastly 
voices.” 

“Damn it all!” cried young Ledyard violently. 
“You haven’t got the nerve to sit up there and tell 
me that you call this filthy water-hole Heaven?” 

“Oh, I haven’t, haven’t I?” The Honourable 
Tony regarded the flushed countenance with 
pensive amusement. “I say, you Americans do 
have the most amazing cheek! Who ever asked 
you to come puffing and blowing into my own par¬ 
ticular earthly Paradise and start in slanging it all 
over the shop? Filthy water-hole, by Gad! You 
won’t recognize Heaven when you have the milk 
and gold and harps and honey stuck under your 
silly nose.” 

Ledyard rose sharply to his feet. 


274 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


“All right, I’ll be off, then, and not waste any 
more of the valuable time that you’re employing so 
profitably. As you suggest, no one asked me to 
hurl myself into your affairs, and you’ve managed 
to make it good and clear that I was a lunatic to 
think that you’d take advice or help from me or 
any other well-meaning fool on the face of the 
earth. If you’ll get hold of one of those black 
swine that make up your circle of friends, these 
days, and tell them to get my men and the 
raft-” 

“My dear old chap!” The Honourable Tony 
was at Ledyard’s side in two great strides, his arm 
was about Ledyard’s shoulders in the old, re¬ 
membered gesture of gay affection. “For God’s 
sake, do try to remember that I am simply a 
feather-headed goat who can’t for the life of him 
say three consecutive inoffensive syllables—I give 
you my word that I was born with both feet in my 
mouth—actually! As for your taking the time 
and trouble to come tooting up that frightful river 
in order to throw me a life-line, I could sit down 
and howl with emotion whenever I think of it— 
no, I swear that’s the truth! Do sit down again 
like a good chap—it’s absolute rot to talk about 
going before sundown; the sun would simply melt 
you down like a tallow candle. Besides, the jetty¬ 
eyed companion of your travels isn’t back from her 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


275 


interview with His Majesty, and you can hardly 
abandon her to our tender mercies—oh, well, 
hardly! I say, didn’t you gather that she was 
going to romp straight back to our sheltering wings 
as soon as she’d presented the heart-wrung peti¬ 
tion?” 

“If you believe two words the lying little devil 
says, you’re a worse fool than I am!” said Ledyard 
gloomily. 

The Honourable Tony shouted his delight. 

“Where’s all this hundred per cent. American 
chivalry? What an absolutely shocking way to 
talk about a perfect lady who touchingly relies on 
your being a perfect gentleman. ‘Meestair Billee 
Ledyar’, allaways, allaways he conduck heemself 
like a mos’ pairfick genteelman! ’ ” 

He shouted again at the sight of Meestair 
Billee Ledyar’s revolted countenance. 

“Calvert, when I think what I’ve been through 
with that beastly limpet, jabbering all day and 
hysterics all night—it’s nothing short of a miracle 
that I didn’t bash her head against the anchor 
and feed her to the crocodiles. Who the devil is 
she, anyway?” 

“Daisy de Vallorosa? My dear chap, why ask 
iner 

“Well, I do ask you. She seems to know who 
you are all right!” 


276 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


“Does she, indeed? OLTpon my word, that's 
interesting!” 

He cocked his head attentively, guileless and 
inscrutable. 

“Yes, she does indeed. Come on—let me in on 
this! Did she honestly come up here to get help 
for a brother dying in the tin mines, or is this a 
rendezvous that the two of you fixed up in Singa¬ 
pore?” 

His host looked shocked but magnanimous. 

“William, William—no, frankly, you appall me! 
What a sordid mind you have under that sunny 
exterior; out upon you! I never make rendezvous 
—absolutely not.” 

“Well, she swore that she’d met you and Bhakdi 
at a special concert while he was visiting Singa¬ 
pore.” 

“Oh, extremely special,” murmured the Hon¬ 
ourable Tony, a reminiscent gleam in his eye. 
“Rather! She sang some little songs that were 
quite as special as anything I’ve ever heard in my 
life, and at one time or another I’ve heard a good 
few. Bhakdi was most frightfully bowled over; 
he gave her two hammered gold buckles and a 
warm invitation to drop in on him at any time that 
she was in the neighbourhood. I rather fancy 
that that’s what’s at the bottom of all this; taking 
one thing with another, I’m inclined to believe that 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


m 


Necessity became a Mother again when our little 
Daisy barged into you, and that the expiring 
brother is simply one of her inventive offspring. 
Hence, death and the tin mines! By the way, just 
how did the young female barge into you?” 

“She had the next seat on the train from Singa¬ 
pore, curse her!” replied Ledyard vindictively. 
‘'And she sat there as good and quiet as pie, 
squeaking out, ‘Yes, I sank you’ and ‘No, I sank 
you’ every time I asked her if she wanted the 
window up, or the shades down or—or anything. 
I tell you butter wouldn’t have melted in her nasty 
little painted mouth! Then when we found that 
you and Bhakdi had lit out after tigers, and I 
decided that I’d just have time before the next boat 
to hire a crew and hunt you down, she went off into 
twenty-one different kinds of hysterics until I 
promised to bring her along, too. ‘Five meenit— 
only five small lil’ meenit to spik weeth the gr-reat, 
the good Sultan, and the gr-reat, nobl’ Honable 
Meestaire Tonee Calver’, and her Manuelo would 
be restore once more to her arms.’ When I think 
that I fell for that I could choke down a quart of 
carbolic straight.” 

“Oh, I can quite see how it came about—quite, 
quite!” murmured the Honourable Tony, pen¬ 
sively sympathetic. 

“Believe me, you can’t see the half of it!” 



278 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


Ledyard ran a frenzied hand through the sandy 
hair. “ Listen, how about getting away now, be¬ 
fore she turns up?” 

“Well, upon my word, you unprincipled young 
devil, Fve yet to hear a cooler proposition! 
Damme if you don’t curdle the blood—damme if 
you don’t. Are you asking me to sit by and con¬ 
done a callous desertion of this young female to 
the lures of a wily and dissolute potentate?” 

Ledyard faced his delighted inquisitor un¬ 
abashed. 

“Oh, go on—I’ll bet that’s what she’s after—and 
if you ask me, lie’s plenty good enough for her. 
She’s probably a cousin of his; any one wdth all that 
fuzzy black hair and those black saucer eyes and 
nasty glittery little teeth-” 

“Wrong again, dear boy. The lady is undeni¬ 
ably the legitimate offspring of Lady Scott’s 
English maid and a Portuguese wine merchant, born 
in Madeira. She is also a British subject, being 
the legitimate widow of the late Tommy Potts, 
one-time pianist of the Imperial Doll Baby Girls.” 

“Widow?” demanded Ledyard incredulously. 

“Widow and orphan, William. You ought to 
be ashamed of yourself. Tommy, alas, passed 
away while they were touring New Zealand, in a 
distressingly complicated attack of appendicitis 
and D. T.’s. She didn’t tell you?” 




THE HONOURABLE TONY 


279 


“No, she did not tell me,” replied William some¬ 
what aggressively. “ See here, how do you happen 
to know so much about this Portuguese Empire 
Doll Baby?” 

“A trifling matter of a passport, William. 
Purely as a business matter it became my painful 
duty to excavate the lady’s buried past.” 

Ledyard eyed him suspiciously. 

“I believe she’s gone on you and you know it,” 
he said gloomily. “Anyway, if she doesn’t turn 
up pretty soon, I’m going to pull out, and that’s 
that. You and Bhakdi can fight it out between 
the two of you—I’m through chaperoning Daisy de 
Vallorosa Potts from now on.” 

“Sorry, but you’re going to have to chaperon 
her clear back to Singapore,” the Honourable 
Tony assured him inflexibly. “If there’s one 
thing that I simply cannot and will not stick it’s 
cheap powder, and if there are two things that I 
simply cannot and will not stick—it’s cheap per¬ 
fume. The less they cost, the more they use. 
Lord, Lord, the perfume that little hussy uses!” 

“If she’s a British subject, it’s your job to look 
out for her. She’s under your protection.” 

“My dear kid, I wouldn’t disturb this enchant¬ 
ing existence by lifting a finger to protect Queen 
Victoria from Don Juan.” 

“Well, she’d better step lively,” remarked her 


280 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


late escort ominously. ‘I’m not joking, you 
know—if I don’t make connections with that boat 
in Singapore, I’m as good as disinherited! My 
Governor’s not so gone on you that he’d consider 
you any excuse for missing two boats, you know.” 

‘‘Not for missing one, you young ass.” The gay 
eyes dwelt on him deeply for a moment, mocking 
and affectionate. “ Your very able parent was one 
fellow who never entertained any illusions as to 
my intrinsic merit, wasn’t he?” 

Ledyard drew a long breath, his face a little pale. 

“Yes,” he said slowly, “he was. That was one 
of the things I wanted to talk to you about. It’s 
hard to talk to you about anything like that, 
Calvert!” 

“Like what?” 

The tone was hardly encouraging for all its 
amiability, but young Ledyard pushed doggedly 
ahead. 

“Like that—anything serious or intimate or real. 
You make it darned difficult, let me tell you.” 

“Then why do it?” 

“Oh, not because I want to!” His angry, tired 
young face bore unmistakable testimony to that. 
“Believe me, if I were consulting my own pleasure 
I’d have told you to go to the devil the first time 
you tried any of that condescending impertinence 
of yours on me.” 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


281 


“Is it beside the mark to ask you just whose 
pleasure you are consulting, then?” 

Young Ledyard set his teeth hard. 

“Pattie’s,” he said, very distinctly. 

The Honourable Tony did not stir, but the eyes 
that he fixed on Pattie’s brother went suddenly 
and incredibly black. After a long pause he re¬ 
peated, evenly and courteously, 

“Pattie’s?” 

“Yes, Pattie’s. That’s half of why I came— 
the other half, if you want to know, is because 
I’m fool enough to care more about you than 
any other man I ever met—than any other two 
men.” 

i 

The wide eyes were suddenly blue again. 

“Thanks,” said the Honourable Tony, and there 
was something startlingly sweet in his smile. 
“Thanks awfully. It’s quite mutual, you know 
—any three men, I should say offhand. Suppose 
we simply let it go at that? And do try one of 
these cigarettes; they really are first-rate.” 

“I can’t let it go at that, I tell you—I wish to the 
Lord I could. Pattie had it all out with Dad, and 
she made me swear that I’d run you down when I 
got out here and bring you back. She said that if 
I couldn’t work it any other way I was to tell you 
that she said ‘Please.’ I’m at the end of my rope, 
Calvert—and Pattie says ‘Please.’ ” 



282 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


The Honourable Tony raised his hand sharply, 
staring through Pattie’s brother as though he saw 
someone else. Possibly he did see someone else— 
someone as clear and cool in that dim, hot room as 
a little spring, someone who stood there very small 
and straight with young Ledyard’s sandy hair 
clasping her brows like a wreath of autumn leaves, 
and young Ledyard’s gray eyes turned to two 
dancing stars, and young Ledyard’s freckles trail¬ 
ing a faint gold powder across the very tip of her 
tilted nose—someone as brave and honest as a 
little boy and as wistful and gentle as a little girl, 
who stood clasping her hands together tightly, and 
said “Please.” 

“No, by God!” cried the Honourable Tony 
loudly. “No!” 

“Don’t yell like that.” Ledyard rapped the 
words out fiercely. “I’m not deaf—all you have 
to say is ‘no’ once. If it’s any satisfaction to you 
to know it, I’m through.” 

He rose to his feet and his host rose, too, 
swiftly, catching at his arm. 

“Rather got the wind up, haven’t we, old thing? 
No, don’t jerk away; it’s simply rotten bad man¬ 
ners, and throws me off my stride completely when 
I’m preparing to do the thing in the grand manner 
—apologies, and amendes honorables and every 
mortal trick in the bag. You’re absolutely right, 




THE HONOURABLE TONY 


283 


you know. It’s far too hot to start shouting, and 
I swear that I’ll keep quiet if you will. We might 
toss off a stirrup cup of quinine, what?” 

“I believe that you’d laugh at a corpse,” said 
Ledyard fiercely. 

The Honourable Tony eyed him for a moment 
strangely—and then shrugged his shoulders. 

“At a corpse—exactly. And there you are!” 

“Well, where am I? D’you want me to tell 
Pattie that all you have to say to her is ‘No, by 
God’?” 

“I want you to tell Pattie just exactly nothing 
whatever; say that I was off tiger hunting with 
the Sultan, and that you couldn’t get track of me 
to save your soul.” 

“Thanks; I don’t go in for lies—more especially 
not with Pattie.” 

“I see.” The Honourable Tony, his hands deep 
in his pockets, evidently saw something not en¬ 
tirely flattering, judging from the curl to his lip. 
After a minute, however, he dismissed it with an¬ 
other careless shrug. “Oh, spare your conscience 
by all means. Give Pattie my love, then, and tell 
her that I’d like most awfully to run up and wipe 
her out at tennis, but that I’m so indispensable 
here that I can’t possibly make it.” 

“That all?” 

“Quite all, thanks.” 


284 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


“But, good Lord, I tell you that she wants 
you-” 

“You misunderstood her.” 

“Don’t be a fool. She told me-” 

The Honourable Tony jerked forward suddenly, 
his fingers biting into Ledyard’s arm, his low voice 
savage as a whip. 

“Drop it, will you? Drop it!" At the sight 
of the blank and stricken amazement in the other’s 
eyes he broke off sharply, his fingers relaxing their 
grip. “Oh, Lord love us, we’re both fit for a mad¬ 
house! Throw some water over me—pound my 
head against the wall—do something but stand 
there staring like another lunatic. Pull your jaw 
back, there’s a good kid.” 

Ledyard stared at him wretchedly. 

“But, Calvert, I swear that I don’t understand. 
I thought—we all thought—that you—that you 
cared for her-” 

“My dear fellow, what in the world has that got 
to do with it? The more I cared for her the less 
likely I’d be to go within a thousand miles of her. 
For God’s sake, and Pattie’s sake, and my sake, 
try to get this straight. I am absolutely no good. 
I don’t mean that I’m one of your deep-dyed, 
hair-raising villains—no such luck; I’m simply a 
waster and rotter of the very first water who’s 
gone to and fro over the face of the earth doing the 






THE HONOURABLE TONY 


285 


things that he ought not to have done, and leaving 
undone the things that he ought to have done for 
more years than he cares to remember. You’re 
worse than mad to tempt me to forget it; don’t do 
it again, there’s a good chap. And while you’re 
about it, try and remember that the best there is 
isn’t half good enough for Pattie.” 

Ledyard swallowed hard. 

“I don’t care—you can talk till you’re black in 
the face, and I won’t believe that you know your¬ 
self. If it came to a show-down, you’d be as good 
as the best.” 

“ Thanks. As it’s not likely to, you can take 
my word for it that I’m not of the stuff of which 
heroes are made, even in a pinch. Now that that’s 
settled, how about hunting up the little Vallorosa 
hussy? It’s getting on a bit.” 

“I hope to the Lord she’s decided to settle here 
for life.” 

“Oh, rot. Tell you what, if the young thing 
doesn’t turn up pretty promptly, we’ll call out the 
royal, holy, gold-fringed, pearl-tasselled, diamond- 
studded red parasols, and romp over in time to 
cadge some light refreshments from His Majesty. 
He has a cognac that will make you sit up and yelp 
with excitement; Napoleon—the real stuff, I pledge 
you my word. I suppose that it will be simply 
thrown away on you; half a nip of prune cordial 


286 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


sets the good old world going round for you Yankee 
martyrs these days, what?” 

“Help!” invoked Ledyard with gloomy fervour. 
“Glad to know you get the comic sections regu¬ 
larly.” 

“My priceless old thing, we get nothing what¬ 
ever regularly; that’s one of the unholy charms. 
When my royal master and pupil feels any craving 
for mail and newspapers and other foreign frivoli¬ 
ties he summons about twenty of the stalwart 
flowers of the masculine population and bids them 
oil and decorate and adorn themselves as befits the 
occasion and pop into the old lacquer sampans 
and yo heave ho on business of state. A few days 
or a few weeks later they turn up like Santa Claus 
bearing gifts, and I take all the pretty envelopes 
with an English postmark and put them in a nice 
tin can with a nice round stone, and drop ’em out of 
the window plop into the jolly old river—returned 
unopened, with many, many thanks! You never 
can tell when one of the tricky little devils might 
read ‘Anthony, come home, all is forgiven.’ ” 

“But, my Lord, they must be worried half 
frantic! How do they know whether you’re alive 
or dead?” 

“My dear chap, the only thing that the Boling- 
hams have ever* worried about as far as little 
Anthony Christopher’s concerned was that he 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


£87 


mightn’t have the grace to die before one of his 
waggish pranks landed him in jail or actually cost 
them something in pounds and shillings instead of 
mere lamentations! That’s why I gratified them 
by throwing over my share of the title when 
I came of age. Lord Anthony, what? No, 
thanks. But it’s all too clear that you don’t know 
Aunt Pamela and Aunt Clarissa, the last of the 
Bolingham vestals, or those splendid fellows, 
Roderick, Cyril, and Oliver.” 

“Good-night, I’d hate to be as bitter as that 
about my worst enemy.” Ledyard’s honest drawl 
was chilled and thoughtful. 

“Bitter? About my priceless family?” His 
careless mirth flooded the quiet room. “No, I 
swear that’s good! Why, my child, I revel in 
’em; I have ever since Oliver used to jerk me out of 
bed at two in the morning to wallop the everlasting 
soul out of me because he’d lost at ecarte —ragging 
along all the time about how it was his sacred duty 
as head of the Bolingham family to see that I 
learned not to disgrace it again by getting in 
through the scullery window at nine o’clock of a 
fine August night. I wasn’t more than three feet 
high, with a face no bigger than a button, but I 
couldn’t keep it straight then and I can’t keep it 
straight now when I think of that enormous red 
mug of his with all those noble sentiments pouring 


288 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


out of it—and the harder he walloped and the 
nobler he gabbled, the more I knew he’d lost. I 
was Satan’s own limb even in those days, and he 
generally managed to dig up some excellent and 
fruity reason for improving the witching hours with 
a boot-strap, but it undeniably was one on both 
of us that the night that he lost one hundred and 
thirty-seven golden guineas I’d been in bed in a 
state of grace since early dawn, with a nice bit of 
fever and a whopping toothache.” 

“ And just what did he do about that?” inquired 
Ledyard grimly. He did not seem to be as carried 
away by the humour of the situation as the 
Honourable Tony, whose carved dimples had be¬ 
come riotous at memory. 

“Oh, you simply have to credit Noll for resource 
—he trounced the skin off me for adding hypocrisy 
to my list of iniquities! And there was I, innocent 
as a water baby of guilt or guile for twenty-four 
priceless hours—you'll have to admit that it was a 
good one on me. I’ve taken jolly good care from 
that day to this that I didn’t let a night come 
around without deserving a simply first-rate can¬ 
ing, let me tell you!” 

Ledyard made a gesture of fierce disgust. 

“Do you mean to tell me that your own brother 
beat you night after night and no one lifted a hand 
to stop him?” 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


289 


“Oh, well, come, who do you think was going 
to stop him?” inquired the Honourable Tony with 
indulgent amusement. “After all, the noble Duke 
had a fairly good right to see that a cheeky brat 
learned all of the sacred traditions of the family 
from the sacred head of the family, hadn’t he? 
Well, rather! All the more to his credit that the 
little jackanapes wasn’t his own brother.” 

“Wasn’t?” echoed Ledyard blankly. 

“Oh, come, come—you don’t mean to say that 
no one’s told you the true history of the little black 
sheep rampant on the Bolingham arms? No? 

Oh, I say, I am let down- I thought all you 

chaps used to jaw about it for hours between 
flights! No one even said a word about it down 
the river? Well, there’s glory for you; it begins 
to look as though I’d won your kind attentions 
under entirely false pretences, my dear kid. All 
the time that you’ve been thinking me a purely 
blue specimen of the British aristocracy I’ve been a 
black skeleton and a dancing sheep and a mere 
paltry half brother to His Grace the Duke of 
Bolingham—and it begins to look as though I 
were an impostor to boot. I say, I am sick.” 

He looked far from sick; leaning back in the long 
chair with his brown hands clasped behind his 
bright head, he looked radiantly and outrageously 
amused. 




290 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


Ledyard gave a vicious kick to an innocuous 
rattan stool. 

“I don’t know what you’re driving at, but if 
you’re implying that the reason that I was mis¬ 
guided enough to choose you for a friend, was that 
you happened to have a duke for your father, you 
can shut your mouth and eat your words. I’d 
always understood that you were Bolingham’s 
son, but I don’t give a curse if he picked you out of 
an ash-can, and you know it. Dukes mean noth¬ 
ing in my young life, let me tell you. If you aren’t 
Bolingham’s son, who are you?” 

“Oh, I’m Bolingham’s son, all right enough, 
only unlike Noll and Cyril and Roddie, I don’t 
happen to be able to claim the Lady Alicia Honoria 
Fortescue as my mother. No, no, nothing to 
bring the blush of shame to that ingenuous brow, 
William. The lady died some eighteen years before 
I arrived on the scene, so neither of us can be 
blamed, you’ll admit. My mother’s name hap¬ 
pened to be Biddy O’Rourke, and I’d be willing to 
take an oath that she was prouder of that and 
being able to dance longer on her toes than any one 
else in the London music halls, than of the minor 
matter of bearing the title of Duchess of Boling- 
ham and having forty-two servants call her ‘Your 
Grace.’ Your Grace! I shouldn’t be surprised 
if it fitted her better than the Lady Alicia Honoria.” 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


291 


“You mean he was married to her?” 

“Rather—rather, my young sleuth! There 
was all too little doubt on that score to make it 
pleasant for any one but the unregenerate Duke 
and his Duchess. It seemed to afford them con¬ 
siderable amusement.” 

“I didn’t know that dukes married—married 
artists.” Young Ledyard eyed his host with sus¬ 
picion; he had fallen victim more than once to the 
soaring flights of that gentleman’s imagination. 

“They don’t; that was exactly what furnished 
all the ripe excitement. He not only married her, 
but he was most frightfully set up about it—fairly 
swollen with pride. Nothing damped them, as 
far as I can learn; Society and the Court and the 
whole blooming family went off their heads with 
excitement and cut her and insulted her and dis¬ 
owned her—and she laughed in their faces and 
danced on their toes. She thought that the whole 
thing was the most stupendous joke; Bunny says 
that there never were five minutes after she came 
to Gray Courts that you couldn’t hear her laughing 
or singing somewhere about the place—and some¬ 
times doing both at once.” 

“Who’s Bunny?” 

“Bunny was her maid—afterward she was my 
own private slave until the magnificent Noll showed 
her the gates of the ancestral home after she’d 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


292 

locked me up in her room one night when he was 
out hunting for me with the boot-strap! She 
went off into the most stunning hysterics right out¬ 
side the door and called him a bloody roaring mon¬ 
ster what ought to have his heart cut out for lay¬ 
ing a finger on an innocent lamb. And when they 
fished the innocent lamb out from under the bed 
and informed him between larrups that his Bunny 
had been hurled into outer darkness by two foot¬ 
men and an under-gardener, he let out the last 
howls of his life. He’d reached the mature age of 
six and a half, but he hasn’t lost or found anything 
since worth a single solitary howl!” 

“Why didn’t your mother and father slop 
them?” demanded Ledyard, looking stem and 
sick and still faintly incredulous. 

“Because the only active interference they were 
capable of at the time would have been with a 
Ouija board,” explained the Honourable Tony 
affably. “Exit Biddy, Duchess of Bolingham, 
laughing, on the day that young Anthony Christo¬ 
pher Stoningham Calvert makes his first bow to a 
ravished family. I’ll wager that before she slipped 
off she realized that it was a good one on all of us, 
too!” 

“Well, but what happened to your father?” 

“Oh, the Black Duke, as he was impolitely re¬ 
ferred to, hadn’t extracted any amusement from 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 293 

life before he discovered his Biddy, and once she 
was gone, he evidently considered it a dingy affair. 
He slunk around the empty corridors for a bit 
hunting for the echo of her laughter, but he got 
tired of that game, too, and died of pneumonia and 
boredom without making any particular fuss— 
though Bunny swears that after everyone in the 
room thought he was gone for good and they all 
were filing out of the room on the tips of reverent 
toes, he flung back his head and gave one great 
roar of laughter—the kind of a roar that he used 
to give when he’d come on little Biddy in a dark 
hall, dancing out an imitation of the Bolinghain 
vestals at their weekly task of patronizing the 
parish poor. Bunny said that it fair scared the 
breath out of their bodies, but when they went 
back he was lying there as dead as last year’s wild 
boar.” 

“Calvert, are you making this up?” 

u: 

The Honourable Tony turned his head sharply 
toward his interlocutor, his dark eyes narrowed to 
slits. After a moment’s cold scrutiny of the 
troubled countenance, he shrugged his shoulders 
with a not highly diverted laugh. 

“My dear kid, I suppose that I’ve asked for this 
by over-valuing your powers of discrimination! 
Just as a tip, though, I may pass on to you the in¬ 
formation that even the clown in the circus is apt 



294 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


to draw the line at playing the giddy fool over his 
mother. I might add, moreover, that my fertile 
imagination would balk at inventing any one as 
delightful as the lady who did me the honour to be 
mine/’ 

Ledyard, flushed to the bone, met the ironic 
gaze with considerable dignity. 

“I beg your pardon,” he said. “As you imply, 
I’m a tasteless fool.” 

“And so you’re in excellent company!” his host 
assured him. “I will now rapidly descend from 
the ancestral high-horse and prove to you, strictly 
as a matter of penance, that I am not invariably a 
liar. If you’ll wait just half a shake, I’ll present 
you to Biddy, ninth Duchess of Bolingham.” 

He vanished into the room at the back with a 
reassuring gleam over his shoulder at young Led- 
yard’s startled countenance, and was back in 
rather less than half a shake with a shabby black 
case in his hands. He put it carefully on the table 
between them, touched a spring, and stepped with 
a low bow. 

“There!” he announced. “Madame Biddy, 
the American kid with the freckles—you know the 
one. Mr. Bill Ledyard from Ohio, the Duchess of 
Bolingham—from Ireland.” 

Out of the black velvet frame there smiled, 
wicked and joyful, a tiny vision of gold and ivory 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


29 5 


and sapphire. The head, with its froth of bright 
curls, lightly tilted—the nose tilted, too—and the 
lips tilted, too—there she sat laughing down the 
years, gay as a flower, reckless as a butterfly, lovely 
as a dream. 

“Buffets and insults and three inimitable step¬ 
children and four incomparable sisters-in-law— 
and then some artist chap came along and painted 
her like this!” The Honourable Tony leaned 
over, touching the gauzy folds of the dress with a 
light and caressing finger. “ She’s a bit incredible, 
after all, you know! They were going to crush all 
that life and laughter clear down into the earth, 
and away she went dancing through their fingers 
into the dust that was just a flower garden to her. 
She’s more alive this minute than they’ll ever be in 
all their everlasting stale lives. Ah, Biddy darlin’, 
look at you now after flirtin’ with the fine young 
man from America, and you with the blessed 
saints to teach you wisdom all these weary long 
years.” 

Ledyard stared down at her, young and awed 
and tongue-tied. 

“ She’s—she’s the prettiest thing that I ever 
saw—honestly.” 

“Oh, prettier than that, young Bill. She’s the 
prettiest thing that ever lived—or ever died. 
And she was such a lovely little lunatic herself that 




296 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


we get on famously. We know what a joke it all 
is, don’t we, Biddy? God be praised, we even 
know when it’s on us. There now, back you go, 
mavourneen, while Mr. Billee Ledyar’ and I start 
out hunting for another lady. Bill, take a look 
across the kampong at the sun while I hunt up my 
helmet—if it’s lower than Bhakdi’s roof you’d 
better be off. It goes down like a rocket in these 
parts, once it gets started.” 

Young Ledyard flung open the great wooden 
door that had barred out the heat, and a little 
breeze came dancing in, barely stirring the strange 
glossy leaves that clustered about the ladder-like 
steps. The sky was blue as steel; behind the black 
shadow of the Sultan’s residence there were livid 
streaks—the world was silent and alien as a dream. 
He shivered strongly, and stepped back into the 
room. 

“The sun’s set,” he said. “There’s someone 
coming across from that shack you call a palace.” 

The Honourable Tony strolled leisurely out of 
his bedroom. 

“Ghundi!” he commented after a brief inspec¬ 
tion. “The incomparable Ghundi.” 

“Who the devil’s Ghundi?” 

“He’s my head boy, William, and the delight 
of my soul; the only honest man I ever knew, sav¬ 
ing your presence. I’ve taught him English, and 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


297 


he’s taught me considerably more than that—oh, 
considerably. What tidings, Ghundi?” 

The bronze statue saluted with a grave and 
beautiful precision. 

“Master, the Great One says that the white 
woman stays. Let your friend return down the 
waters without her.” 

The Honourable Tony lifted his brows. 

“Stays with the Great One, Ghundi?” 

“With the Great One, Master.” 

The Honourable Tony glanced pensively at the 
dark bulk of the palace. 

“So much for that!” he murmured gently. 
“Bear my compliments to the Great One, Ghundi. 
Is all in readiness at the beach?” 

“The raft waits. Master. Go swiftly, or your 
friend will stumble in the night.” 

“Excellent advice! Latch the door after you, 
and on your way, William; I’ll come as far as the 
beach. No, this way. The air feels cool as water, 
doesn’t it? Smell that breeze; it’s straight down 
from the jungle.” 

“It smells of poison,” cried young Ledyard 
fiercely. “The whole place is rank with it—it’s 
crawling. Calvert—Calvert, come back with me. 
I swear I’ll never let you regret it; I swear-” 

“And here we are. Gad, we’re just in time if 
you want to tell the raft from the river. In you 



298 THE HONOURABLE TONY 

go, my lad, and off you go. Lord love you for 
coming!” 

“Calvert, I won’t—I’m not going.” 

The Honourable Tony laid his hands lightly and 
strongly on the boy’s shoulders, pushing him re¬ 
lentlessly toward the water. 

“My dearest kid, don’t be an ass. If you 
stayed one minute longer, you’d ruin the best 
memory of my life. I mean it. Off with 
you.” 

He stood with one arm flung up in a reassuring 
gesture of farewell until the bamboo raft with its 
sandy-haired occupant vanished around the dim 
curve of the river. The night was falling with the 
velvet precipitation of the tropics—even while he 
stood its dark mantle was about him; new per¬ 
fumes stole from its folds, troubling and exquisite, 
and one by one its jewels shone out—the small, 
ruddy fires of the kampong , an occasional lantern 
swinging hurriedly by and, square by square, the 
distant windows in the Sultan’s residence, flashing 
aggressive as a challenge. He lowered his arm 
somewhat abruptly. Very gay to-night, the Sul¬ 
tan’s residence; gayer than was its wont—gay as 
for some high festivity. The imperial Bhakdi 
was not greatly given to such prodigal display of 
oil and tallow; his mentor eyed the illumination 
critically, and then, with the old indifferent shrug, 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


299 


swung leisurely off through the blackness toward 
the shadow deeper than the surrounding shadows 
that was home. He ran lightly up the crazy steps, 
felt for the latch—and drew back his hand as 
sharply as though he had touched hot coal. He 
had touched something more startling than any 
coal; the groping fingers had closed on emptiness. 
The latched door was open. 

“Ghundi!” His voice cut sharply into the dark 
space that a few minutes before had been a room, 
green-cushioned, white-matted, commonplace, and 
serene. “ Ghundi!” 

Silence—haunted and ominous. The Honour¬ 
able Tony leaned against the door frame and 
addressed the shadows. 

“Of course, this is frightfully jolly! I’d have 
laid out a mat with welcome drawn up all over it 
if I’d had the faintest notion of what was in store 
for me—though that would have been a bit super¬ 
fluous, come to think of it! You seem to have 
managed nicely without any mat at all. I hope 
you’ve made yourself quite at home? ” 

Silence. The Honourable Tony did not move, 
but he raised his voice. 

“Mrs. Potts! I say, I hope you’ve made your¬ 
self quite at home?” 

From the hushed depths came a small, frantic 
commotion. 




300 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


“Ah, be qui -yet!" The desperate whisper 
came toward him in a rush. “Be qm-yet, I do 
implore!” 

“Oh, my dear girl, come now! Silence may be 
golden, and all that—and naturally I’m enor¬ 
mously flattered at finding you lurking around the 
corners of my humble abode, but before we do 
away with the human voice entirely, why not have 
a go at straightening out one or two minor matters? 
The first being just precisely what in the devil 
you’re doing here instead of on Ledyard’s boat?” 

“Meestaire Honable Tonee, on my knees I pray 
to you, be more quiyet! Lissen, lissen, come more 
close. I tell you evairy thing. No, come more 
close. Do not let them see—do not, do not let 
them hear. Ah—ah—more sof’, more still! So!” 

Out of the blackness the suppliant whisper drew 
him like a taut thread—nearer, nearer—he stum¬ 
bled over something small and yielding, swore and 
laughed in the same quick breath, and felt two 
fluttering hands clutch at him, closing over his 
wrist in frantic protest. 

“No, no, do not laff—hush, do not laff, I say.” 

“Well, but what in hell ?” inquired the Honour¬ 
able Tony, softly enough to satisfy even his exigent 
audience. “No, I say, drop it, there’s a good 
little lunatic! I’m after the matches; they’re on 
this table somewhere-” 




THE HONOURABLE TONY 301 

* 

“Honable Tonee—lissen—eef one of those 
matches you should light, we die.” 

“Oh, we do, do we? Well, death will be a 
blessed relief for one of us and a just retribution 
for the other. Why hasn’t someone killed you for 
using that simply frightful stuff long before this, 
Daisy?” 

“What stuff ees that? Ah, ah, Honable Tonee, 
I am a-frighten to die; I am a-frighten!” 

“But after all, that hardly alters the merits of 
the case, now does it? Though even death doesn’t 
seem to quite expiate the crime! Do you bathe in 
it?” 

“But in what? Lissen—I tell you, lissen-” 

“Lissen yourself, my child; it’s I who am going 
to tell you. Apparently you’ve had no guidance 
whatever so far, but precisely here is where you 
acquire a guardian angel. Daisy, little girls have 
been boiled in oil for less than using one drop of 
the noxious fluid in which you are drowning.” 

“No, I do not onnerstan’—no, but lissen, I beg, 
I pray—you mus’ hide me, Honable Tonee, you 
mus’ hide me fas’ before he come to keel us both.” 

“Hide you?” The Honourable Tony yielded 
to unregenerate mirth above the terrified murmurs 
of protest. “My dear Potts, you might pre¬ 
cisely as well ask a thimble to hide a perfume 
factory! Actually, you know, when I was clean 





302 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


over there by the door, it fairly bowled me off my 
feet.” 

“Hush—oh, hush—eet ees my pairfume?” 

“It is indeed—it most emphatically is.” 

“You could know eet from that door?” 

“I could know it from the far edge of the kam- 
pongN 

“Then they fin’ me—then, oh, they fin’ me!” 

At the sick terror of that small wail the Hon¬ 
ourable Tony stirred. 

“I say, you’re not really frightened, are you?” 

“I am vairy frighten’ to die,” his visitor told him 
simply. “You are not?” 

“Well, I’d be jolly well let down, I can tell you! 
It would upset my schedule no end; so if it’s all 
right with you we might go on living for a bit.” 

“But that I think we cannot do,” said the small, 
chilled whisper. 

“The deuce you say!” commented the Honour¬ 
able Tony pensively. He swung himself up onto 
the table, and sat staring into the darkness for a 
minute, his head cocked on one side, swinging his 
long legs over its edge. “Look here, suppose we 
stop entertaining each other and bag a few of the 
blood-curdling facts. What do you say to diving 
in again at the beginning of all the small talk, and 
telling me just exactly what you’re doing trotting 
into my humble dwelling and turning it into a 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


SOS 


cross between a madhouse and a cemetery? The 
woman’s touch, so long lacking, what? Do stop 
crying; nothing in the whole world’s worth crying 
about like that—not even that infernal perfume!” 

“I cry becaus’ vairy greatly I am afraid,” she 
explained gently. 44 An’ vairy greatly I am sorry 
that I bring to your poor abode such pain an’ grief 
an’ danger. I make you all excuse; I did not know 
wair else to go—no, truly, truly I did not 
know-” 

“But why in the name of grief didn’t you go to 
the boat?” 

“Honable Tonee, eet was gone, eet was gone!” 

“Oh, rot! The boat was here until a few min¬ 
utes ago. Look here, my dear child, if you’re 
trying any of your little tricks on me, I can save 
you any amount of time and trouble by tipping you 
off to the fact that you’re heading straight for a 
wash-out. This whole performance looks most 
frightfully dodgy and I’m beginning to be pretty 
fairly fed up. From brother Manuelo on-” 

The limp bundle shivering quietly beneath his 
fingers shivered more deeply still, and sighed. 

“About Manuelo, that was a lie.” 

“Well, it’s gratifying to have my worst sus¬ 
picions confirmed, naturally! But of all the con¬ 
founded cheek-” 

“Eet was jus’ a lie that Manuelo he was my 





304 THE HONOURABLE TONY 

I 

brothair. Manuelo, he ees the belove’ of my 
heart.” 

“The devil he is!” The Honourable Tony’s 
voice was edged with mild interest. “And may 
I ask why the brotherly transformation?” 

“What ees that?” 

“Why the lie, Daisy?” 

“Because men, too well do I know them. Ah, 
ah, too well! Eef I say to Meestair Ledyar’, to 
that black devil out from hell, to your own self, 
Honable Tonee, that eet ees tryin’ to save the be¬ 
love’ of my heart that I go crezzy in my haid and 
die two thousan’ death from terror, you think they 
lissen to me then? You think they help me then? 
Well, me, I think not.” 

“And me, I think not, too!” agreed the Hon¬ 
ourable Tony promptly. “Quite a student of hu¬ 
man nature, in your quiet way, aren’t you, Daisy? 
I say, do let’s have some light on this! I don’t 
think that Manuelo would fancy it for a moment 
if he knew that we were all huddled up here 
in the pitch-black whispering things at each 
other.” 

“Manuelo, one thousan’ time he have tell me eef 
he fin’ me with a man alone, he cut the heart out 
from our body.” 

“Perhaps it’s all for the best that he’s going to 
remain in the tin mines,” suggested the Honour- 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


305 


able Tony philosophically. “No cloud without a 
silver lining, what? However, I’m going to hu¬ 
mour Manuelo to the extent of seeing that we have 
all the light that a large lamp can cast over what I 
trust is going to prove a brief interview. Do stop 
whimpering, there’s a good child!” 

“Honable Tonee, thees lamp you mus’ not light. 
See, no longer I cry—no longer I make one soun’ 
—only thees lamp you mus’ not light. No, wait, 
you do not onnerstan’-” 

“You’re putting it conservatively, Daisy!” 

“Wait, then, I tell you—all I make clear—but 
no light. Eef there is a light, he know you are 
here; eef he know you are here, he know that I, too, 
am here—an’ eef he know I, too, am here, then we 
die. That ees clear now? ” 

“Well, frankly, it still leaves a bit to be desired. 
One or two minor gaps—who is it that’s going to 
slay us when he comes to the conclusion that we’re 
both here, Daisy? Manuelo?” 

“No, no, no—Manuelo, I tell you, he dvin’ in 
those tin mines.” 

“Oh—well, then, candidly, you have me. If it 
isn’t Manuelo, my mind is a perfect blank as to 
who would profit by doing away with us. Unless 
—vou haven’t misled me about Mr. Potts, have 
you?” 

“Ah, what now?” 





306 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


“Mr. Potts is still dead?” 

“Honable Tonee, eet ees not well to mock—eet 
ees not well to laff! He was dead like I say; eet 
ees not good to mock the dead.” 

“He has my abject apologies. But that brings 
us back to the murderer.” 

“Murderair?” 

“By all means—the cove who’s going to dash in 
and dispose of us if I light the lamp.” 

“Honable Tonee, you know well eet ees he, that 
mos’ accurse’ black devil of all black devils to 
whom I pray to save my Manuelo.” 

“Daisy, it can’t be our royal Bhakdi that you’re 
referring to in these unmeasured terms?” 

And suddenly she clung to him, weeping ab¬ 
jectly through her clicking teeth. 

“No, no, nevair say hees name—nevair spik it! 
Wair ees there I can be hid—wair ees there I can 
be hid far away? I am a-frighten to die—Man¬ 
uelo—ah-h—Manuelo! ” 

The Honourable Tony felt for the small, untidy 
silken head in the darkness, patting it with deft 
but reluctant fingers. 

“My dear kid, if it’s Bhakdi who’s been frighten¬ 
ing you into this state, it’s a good deal simpler 
than one, two, three to straighten it out. Tell you 
what: you curl up in this wicker chair—there, put 
your head back, and take a long breath—and I’ll 





THE HONOURABLE TONY 


307 


stroll over to the royal residence and put the fear 
of God and England into the little blighter. Don’t 
howl; it’s going to be absolutely all serene, I 
swear-” 

But at that the soft convulsion of weeping 
deepened to mysterious vehemence. 

“No, no, nevair stir—nevair—nevair! He mus’ 
not know I come here; he mus’ not know I have 
see you—eef he know that, you die-” 

“Daisy, you’ve been running in too much to the 
cinemas. What you need is a good stiff dose of 
‘Alice in Wonderland.’ ‘Off with his head’, what? 
My good child, the little bounder eats out of my 
hand—either or both. He-” 

“No, no, no, he keel you,” the frantic, obstinate 
little voice stammered in desperate urgency. 
“That he tell to me—that he say to me—he keel 
you.” 

“But in the name of the Lord, why?” 

“Becaus’ I tell to heem that if once more he lay 
on me hees black an’ dirty han’s I go to you for 
help. Ah, Maria, hees han’s—ah, Manuelo, 
Manuelo!” 

“Daisy—Daisy, this is all simply too good to be 
true; no, honestly, I’m wrenching my mind out of 
its socket trying to believe you. You’ll swear he 
said that he’d kill me? But why? Why?” 

“Becaus’ ovair me he ees gone crezzy.” The 








308 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


tear-sodden whisper was charged with mournful 
pride. “Ovair me he ees gone crezzy mad. He 
tell to me that he marry with me—that the jewels 
from hees las’ two wive he give to me for prez- 
zens-” 

The Honourable Tony yielded to another gale of 
delighted mirth. 

“Well, upon my word, you couldn’t ask for any¬ 
thing fairer than that! Why not accept?” 

“Hush—hush—more still! You have forgot 
Manuelo?” 

“To be entirely candid, my child, I had forgot 
Manuelo. It’s delightful to know that you haven’t, 
however! Well, but then how in the world did 
you get here?” 

“I have jump out from a window.” 

“From a- Daisy, you’re making this up!” 

“No, no—for why, for why should I make thees 
up, Honable Tonee? Lissen, he have lock me up 
in a great ogly room, until I come back into my 
sense, he say, becaus’ so bad I cry an’ scream, an’ 
cry an’ scream—lissen, so then I jump from out 
that window. Ah, ah, Dios, eet was too high, 
that window; my haid eet ache, my haid eet ache 
so bad, while I have crawl an’ crawl through all the 
black—but that boat he was gone away, Honable 
Tonee, an’ me, I am a-frighten till I die, becaus’ I 
do not know wair to go. Lissen, I am a mos’ bad 






THE HONOURABLE TONY 


309 


girl—I bring to you danger an’ worry, but my haid 
eet hurt, and I do not know wair-” 

“My dear Daisy, you knew exactly.” The 
Honourable Tony administered a final reassuring 
pat, and swung off from the table. “You showed 
really extraordinary judgment, not to go into the 
matter of taste. This is Liberty Hall, my priceless 
child; you should feel entirely at home with 
practically no effort. Before you settle down 
definitely, however, we might run over our 
lines in case the Imperial Bhakdi takes it into 
his head to drop in on us before we’ve worked 
out any very elaborate campaign for Liberty 
and Manuelo, the heart’s belove’. D’you think 
he’s liable to dash over before I could hunt 
up Ghundi and a sampan, and head you down 
stream?” 

“No, no—no, no, no—do not leave me! No, I 
die when you shall leave me!” 

“ Oh, come! ” remonstrated the Honourable Tony 
blithely. “That’s spreading it on fairly thick, 
you know—I don’t believe that Manuelo would 
pass over that kind of thing for a minute. Look 
here, I’ll be back before you can get through Jack 

Robinson-” 

“No! No!” 

It was indecent for any living creature to show 
such abject terror, more like a tortured and 




310 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


frenzied kitten than a sane human being. The 
Honourable Tony shrugged his shoulders. 

“Oh, it’s quite all right with me, you know! I 
simply thought if the little beggar was roving about 
it might be tidier and simpler to get you out of the 
way—though it would be any amount jollier if 
you were around, naturally. We could do some¬ 
thing nice with a screen—or there’s the other 
room; on the whole, that has more possibilities. 
By Gad, we can get some simply stunning effects, 
with practically no trouble at all. I’ve an auto¬ 
matic in there.” 

“Ah-h-h!” 

“My dear kid, don’t go off like that again, or I 
won’t let you put a finger on it. In the extremely 
remote event that I am dragged kicking and 
screaming from the scene of action, however, you 
could do some very amusing tricks with it, includ¬ 
ing potting our imperial friend. Are you a good 
shot, Daisy?” 

“No, no—what you say now? Do not let heem 
come; do not let heem—no thing could I shoot— 
no thing-” 

“Well, there’s one thing that any duffer in the 
world can shoot,” said the Honourable Tony 
soothingly. “There’s absolutely no use shaking 
like that; not as long as any stupid little girl in the 
world can shoot herself! It’s a simply ripping 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


311 


pistol, Daisy.” He put one arm about her, light 
and close, and she relaxed against it with a strange, 
comforted little moan. “So that’s that; of course 
there’s not half a chance in a thousand that the 
little beggar won’t grovel all over the place; I’ll tell 
him that if he lays one finger on a British subject. 
I’ll take jolly good care that England turns it into 
an international matter-” 

“Oh, for that, he does not care!” 

“How do you mean, doesn’t care?” 

“No, for Englan’ he does not care—no, not 
that! When I say to heem that great Englan’ 
will protec’ me, he laff right out an’ say, ‘Englan’, 
bah!”’ 

“Oh, he said that, did he? ” inquired the Honour¬ 
able Tony grimly. “Well, that’s not a pretty 
thing for any fat little Sultan to say.” He grinned 
suddenly into the darkness. “‘Englan’, bah!’ 
Come to think of it, I’ve murmured something 
fairly like it myself once or twice. But then I’m 
not a fat little Sultan; I happen to be an English¬ 
man! Daisy, will you swear not to howl if I tell 
you something?” 

“What now?” 

“Well, now it begins to look as though things 
were going to happen. There’s a fair-sized cluster 
of lights bearing down this way from the royal 
imperial palace at a good fast clip, and I’m rather. 



312 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


inclined to think that it’s time for little girls that 
have heart’s beloveds in the mines to be trotting 
off to a more secluded spot. How about it?” 

“Yes, yes, I go.” There was a strange and 
touching docility in the small voice. “Wair now 
do I go, Honable Tonee?” 

“Here—this way—where’s your hand? Quiet, 
now; sure you aren’t going to howl? ” 

“No; no.” 

“That’s right; here’s the door—nothing in the 
world to howl about, naturally. Wait, and I’ll 
find you a chair; or you can curl up on the bed if 
you’d rather. That comfortable?” 

“Oh, that—that is mos’ comfortable.” 

“Good. Now for God’s sake, emulate the well- 
known mouse! The revolver’s on the table. No 
—no—don’t touch it now. Oh, Lucifer, that 
perfume! It’ll be our ruin—a headless jackass 
could smell it in Singapore. Here, let’s have your 
handkerchief—quick! Steady on there. We’re 
about to receive callers, Daisy!” 

There was the sound of feet on the rickety 
steps—the sound of hands at the outer door. 
The Honourable Tony bent down swiftly; kicked 
off one shoe—the other—ripped off the white linen 
coat and the blue silk scarf, and strode leisurely 
across the threshold of his bedroom door with his 
head on one side and his hands in his pockets. 




THE HONOURABLE TONY 


313 


“What in the devil?” he inquired amiably of 
the bronze statue standing in the pool of light at 
the head of the stairs. The statue stirred, and 
behind it other lights gleamed and danced in dark¬ 
ness. “Oh—it’s you, Ghundi! What’s the row?” 

“Master, the Great One bids that you bring the 
woman and come swiftly to the palace.” 

“Bring what woman?” inquired the Honourable 
Tony, lazily diverted. “I say, Ghundi, the Great 
One hasn’t been having a go at that brandy again, 
has he?” 

The statue did not move but in the pool of light 
its eyes shone, eloquent and imploring. 

“Master, jests will not serve you now. She was 
seen to enter here by the little son of the head- 
beater. The Great One says to make all haste.” 

“Well, inform the Great One from me with cor¬ 
dial salutations that haste is totally foreign to my 
nature,” remarked the Honourable Tony affably. 
“If the largest tiger in the jungle was sitting a paw’s 
length off, I couldn’t possibly move rapidly—it’s 
a most frightful handicap, I can tell you! As for 
the little son of the head-beater, let him be well 
beaten and allowed no fish for three days, or he 
will grow up to be as great a liar as his father. 
Shocking what these infants go in for! Did he 
mention the lady’s name?” 

“Master, master, it is well known that it is the 



314 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


white woman who came up the waters with your 
friend. You do ill to delay.” 

“Ghundi, it’s never Mrs. Potts? Not the rav¬ 
ishing Mrs. Potts? You know, that’s pretty 
priceless in itself. Now suppose you collect all 
your little playmates out there and totter back to 
the Great One and inform him as gracefully as 
possible that the ineffable Potts has gone down the 
waters that she came up, reluctantly escorted by 
Mr. Billee Ledyarh Present my condolences. 
She just caught the boat by the skin of her little 
white teeth. I agree with the Great One that it’s 
a thousand pities that she caught it at all.” 

“Master, I am your servant. I have served you 
well—I have loved you better. My heart is yours 
to use for your meat, my skin for your carpet; for 
them I care nothing. If I return without you, 
they slay me—if I remain with you, they slay me— 
it is all one. But you—you are my master—you 
are my son—you are my father. Delay no longer; 
the woman was seen to enter here—she has not 
come out.” 

The Honourable Tony did not stir from his care¬ 
less station before the bedroom door, but some¬ 
thing leapt across the guarded space to that dark 
and lonely figure—something more warm, more 
friendly, more reassuring than any touch of hands. 

“Ghundi, there are two fellows this side oi 





THE HONOURABLE TONY 315 

Heaven that I’d give a good bit to take there with 
me when I go. That sandy-haired young lunatic 
who came up the waters is one of them—and you’re 
the other. Now cut along back to the Great One, 
like a good fellow, and tell him that I was as good as 
tucked in for the night when you found me, with a 
nice little flicker of fever. If I wasn’t cagy about 
this dashed night air I’d nip over with you and 
explain; as it stands. I’ll trot over the first thing in 
the morning. Good-night, old chap; wish the 
Great One happy dreams.” 

Ghundi’s grave voice was suddenly heavy with 
despair. 

“Master, she is here. The air about us cries it 
to all who breathe.” 

“Absolutely sickening, what?” agreed the Hon¬ 
ourable Tony. “Jockey Club, I understand. I 
picked up her beastly little handkerchief on the 
beach path, coming back from the boat—it’s 
fairly sopped in it. Here, catch—I was going to 
send it back to her, but God knows when it would 
reach her. The Great One might fancy it; com¬ 
pliments of the season—corking souvenir, what?” 

Ghundi stared down at the wet white ball in his 
clenched fist. 

“Master—I was told to search-” 

“And that’ll be about all of that ,” remarked the 
Honourable Tony. A peculiarly ingratiating smile 




316 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


curved the corners of his lips, and he took both 
hands from his pockets and made an expressive 
gesture toward the long windows above the water. 
“A little more chatter like that and out you go to 
the crocodiles. Come on now, cut along like a 
nice chap—my head’s buzzing no end, and I’m mad 
for sleep. I’ll have my tea at seven on the tick. 
And some of that jolly sticky preserve-” 

The dark, troubled face was lit suddenly by a 
smile, gleaming white as a benediction, grave and 
tender and indulgent. 

“Where you go,” said Ghundi, “there may I be 
to serve you! Farewell, little master.” 

He turned back to the dancing lights below him 
with a sharp word of command, and as quietly as 
he had come was gone, passing silently down the 
rickety steps into the night. There was a swift 
murmur of protest from the waiters, quelled; the 
light shuffle of feet; the rustle of parted leaves— 
silence. The Honourable Tony stood for a mo¬ 
ment listening for any echo of the small dying 
sounds—whistled the opening bars of “Where Do 
We Go From Here, Boys?” twice over with fine 
accuracy and restraint, shoved open the bedroom 
door, and yielded himself unreservedly to joyous 
retrospection. 

“My word, fairly neat, eh, Daisy? What price 
the bit about the handkerchief? And the buzzing 





THE HONOURABLE TONY 


317 


head, what? I swear I had no idea I’d be so good. 
Fancy what a loss to the stage—or Scotland Yard— 
no, no, more sport keeping out of Scotland Yard; 
well, then, so that’s that. Now what?” 

There was a small sound that might have been 
a shiver, and a whisper, strange and lonely as a 
dream, answered him. 

“Now then, farewell, Honable Tonee.” 

“Farewell? Thinking of leaving me, Daisy?” 

“Yes. Now I am thinkin’—of leavin’ you.” 

“My poor kid, you’ll shiver your pretty teeth 
out if you keep up like this; I swear I ought to be 
drawn and quartered for a thumping brute. 
After all, it isn’t as much of a lark for you as it is 
for me, is it? Now just what are we going to do 
about you?” 

“Honable Tonee, eet ees not for me I shiver; eet 
ees for you. Becaus’ you do not onnerstan’— 
becaus’ you laff—becaus’ you do not know that all, 
all ees end. That is mos’ terrible—that you who 
are good an’ great an’ love’ by all those Saints do 
not know that eet ees end. Of all those Saints 
and you I ask pardon—I ask pardon, pardon that 
thees I have done to you-” 

“My dear little lunatic, you’ve done nothing in 
the world to me; the blighter knows that if he laid 
a finger on me he’d be as good as cutting his throat. 
While I’m not much given to swanking about it, 





318 THE HONOURABLE TONY 


half of the big sticks in England are my cousins 
and my uncles and my aunts, and though it’s 
rather a grief to us all, they’d simply chew him up 
if he administered as much as a scratch to anything 
as sacred as a Bolingham hide. No, I’m a good 
deal righter than rain and you take a weight off 
my mind about the sentiments of all those Saints; 
the question before the house is, what about you?” 

“Me? Oh, me, eet ees no mattair. Me, I am 
through.” 

“Daisy, I’m just a bit afraid you’re right. We 
might as well face the fact at the start that I’m 
no match for the entire Imperial army, even if an 
important item of their defence does consist of 
green panties. You wouldn’t consider chucking 
it?” 

“How, chuckin’?” 

“You don’t think that Manuelo would under¬ 
stand if you took the two last wives’ jewels 
and-” 

“Ah,” moaned the little voice in the darkness, 
“that ees a wicked, that ees a black an’ ogly thing 
to say. Me, I am no good—me, I am no good at 
all—but that you should have nevair say to 
me-” 

“My dear,” said the Honourable Tony gently, 
“you’re as good as gold, and I’m a black-hearted 
scoundrel that Manuelo ought to flog from here to 




THE HONOURABLE TONY 


319 


his tin mines. In this world or the next, he has 
my congratulations; tell him from me that lie’s a 
lucky devil, won’t you? Now then, I’m off for 
the other room. I’ll light the lamp, and give a 
cracking good imitation of an earnest reader for 
the benefit of any callers. In case it doesn’t meet 
with the proper applause—just in case, you know 
—here’s the revolver. You might bolt the door 
after I’m gone; that way you’ll have any amount 
of time. Not going to be lonely, are you? You 
can hear me just as well as though I still were in 
the room. Moreover, I’m leaving a lady to take 
care of you.” 

“A ladee?” 

“The Duchess of Bolingham. Feel this little 
black frame? Well, she’s in there; hold on tight 
to her. You two are going to adore each other.” 

“No, but I do not onnerstan’; what, what ees 
thees?” 

“This is my mother, Daisy; her first name is 
Biddy. I think she’s going to want you to call her 
by her first name.” 

“But she ees daid, your mothair?” 

“Dead? That’s the most idiotic description of 
Biddy; however, there may be something in what 
you say, though you’ll never get her to admit it. 
Now, then, quite all right? Sure? Good-bye, 
little Daisy.” 



320 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


“Honable Tonee.” 

He had to bend his head to catch that faint and 
wavering whisper. 

“Yes?” 

“Honable Tonee, becaus’ thees room eet ees so 
black an’ still—not, not that I am a-frighten, but 
becaus 5 thees room eet ees so black an’ still, would 
you be so vairy kin’ to kiss me good-bye? Man- 
uelo—Manuelo, he would onnerstan’. You do not 
think that ladee would be angery?” 

The Honourable Tony bent his bright head to 
the dark one, and laid his gay lips swiftly and 
surely on the small painted mouth. 

“ That lady would be terrible in anger if I didn’t. 
Daisy, what nice perfume! Nicest I ever smelled 
in all my life. I’m going to get bottles and bottles 
of it. All right now, little thing? Good-night 
then—Biddy, you look after her; show her all the 
prettiest places up there—mind the two of you 
keep out of mischief! Slip the bolt behind me, 
Daisy.” 

With a last touch on her hair, light and caressing 
as his voice, he was gone through the darkness. 
He pulled the door to behind him noiselessly, and 
stood leaning against it for a moment with bowed 
head, listening. Silence—a faint patter of feet— 
the heavy grating of the bolt driven home. He 
raised his head. 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 


321 


“Good girl!” said the Honourable Tony clearly. 

He swung across to the table, felt for the 
matches, and lit the lamp deftly and swiftly, pull¬ 
ing the long chair into its friendly aura and dis¬ 
tributing the cushions with a rapid dexterity that 
belied the lethargy that he had maintained tigers 
incapable of disturbing. But then, a little wind 
had just passed through the quiet room—a little 
wind that blew in heavy with darkness and fra¬ 
grance and something else—heavy with a distant 
murmur of voices, and far-off footsteps coming 
nearer through the night. It passed as it came, 
but the flame in the lamp flickered and burned 
brighter, and the flame that danced in the eyes of 
the gentleman reclining in the long chair flickered 
and burned brighter, too, though they were dis¬ 
creetly lowered over the account of a highly un¬ 
savory Bazaar murder in a two-month-old paper 
from Singapore. Even when the footsteps were 
on the rickety stairs he continued to read; even 
when they were on the threshold he only bent his 
head a little lower, intent and absorbed; even when 
the knocks rang out, ominous and insistent, he did 
not lift those dancing eyes. He flipped over the 
first page of the Singapore paper with a dexterous 
thumb and finger, and lifted his voice in welcome 
leavened with surprise. 

“Come in!” called the Honourable Tony to 



322 THE HONOURABLE TONY 

those who stood in darkness. And the door 
opened and they came in. 

First there came a small, plump, swarthy gen¬ 
tleman in immaculate white linen of an irre¬ 
proachable cut. He had small neat feet shod 
in the shiniest of patent-leather boots, and small 
fat hands adorned with three superb emeralds, 
and a set of highly unpleasant little cat whis¬ 
kers curling into a grizzled gray at the ends. 
About his throat was a scarlet watered ribbon 
from which dangled a star as glittering as a 
Christmas tree ornament, and about his head was 
wound a turban of very fine red silk pierced by a 
brooch in which crouched another emerald large as 
a pigeon egg, flawed and sinister and magnificent. 
In one fat little hand he held a pair of white kid 
gloves and a small handkerchief badly crumpled; 
in the other a swagger stick of ebony banded with 
smooth gold. He walked on the tips of his patent- 
leather toes, and behind him came ten gigantic 
figures in incredible green uniforms with gold-laced 
jackets that were debtors to the Zouaves, and 
fantastic caps strapped under their chins reminis¬ 
cent of the organ-grinder’s monkey and the danc¬ 
ing vaudeville bellboy. Lanterns light as bubbles 
swung from their great paws and in the gilded hol¬ 
sters at their waists the mother-of-pearl handles of 
the famous automatics gleamed like the Milky Way. 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


323 


They padded behind their master, silent as huge 
cats, and smiled at one another like delighted 
children. His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan 
Bhakdi, accompanied by the Royal Body Guard, 
was making a call on the British Adviser. 

The British Adviser rose easily to his feet. 

“Your Majesty!” he saluted, with precisely the 
correct inflection of gratified amazement. 

“Excellency!” His Majesty’s accent was a 
trifle more British than the Honourable Tony’s, 
but he purred in his throat, which is not done. 
“We were alarmed by the good Ghundi’s report of 
your health. You suffer?” 

“Oh, Ghundi’s overdone it!” protested the 
Honourable Tony, all courteous regret, but the 
carved dimples danced. “I’m no end sorry that 
you’ve had all this bother. It’s frightfully decent 
of you to give it a thought; nothing in the world 
the matter but a rather stiff nip of fever. I was go¬ 
ing to turn in in another minute, and sleep it off. I 
beg any number of pardons for this costume; it’s 
hardly one that I’d have chosen for such an hon- 
our.” 

“Hardly!” agreed the Sultan cordially. 
“Hardly! However, as the visit was unheralded, 
and as the defects of the costume may be so easily 
remedied, we dismiss it gladly. Come, we waive 
formality; we have been bored most damnably i 


324 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


without you and the excellent bridge. The moun¬ 
tain comes to Mahomet; my good Mahomet, on 
with your boots, on with your coat, and out with 
your cards. We will drive off this pestilential 
fever with three good rubbers and four good drinks. 
Ahmet will fetch your coat. It is in your room? 
Ahmet!” 

The Honourable Tony moved more swiftly than 
Ahmet. He laid one hand on the handle of the 
bedroom door, but he did not turn it. 

“I’m absolutely sick over making such an ass of 
myself,” he said with pleasing candour. “But I 
do honestly feel too rotten bad to last out even a 
hand. I’ll be fit as a fiddle in the morning, and 
entirely at Your Majesty’s disposal; but for to¬ 
night I’m going to ask you to excuse me.” 

“But to-night we will most certainly not excuse 
you,” His Imperial Majesty replied amiably. 
“No, no, on the contrary. Rather not, as you 
say. To-night, Excellency, we are quite through. 
We have been culpably lenient and indulgent in 
the past; we have overlooked one hundred stupid 
impertinences and five hundred impertinent stu¬ 
pidities, but your bridge—your bridge was im¬ 
peccable and we have long desired to perfect our 
game. Now, however, you outreach our patience. 
Stand aside, I beg you. When Ahmet fetches 
your Excellency’s coat and your Excellency’s 



THE HONOURABLE TONY 325 

boots, he will also fetch your Excellency’s lady.” 

The Honourable Tony gave a shout of astounded 
delight. 

“My hat!” he cried. “But this is simply gor¬ 
geous. All this time that I’ve been ragging you 
you’ve been plotting a bloody revenge?” 

“Revenge,” replied His Imperial Majesty, with 
an impatient flick of the white gloves, “is an inci¬ 
dent. I wish the woman. Stand aside!” 

“It’s a dream,” decided the Honourable Tony, 
cocking his head with Epicurean satisfaction. 
“No, by Heaven, it’s better than a dream. Just 
what are you going to do if I don’t stand aside?” 

“Shoot you where you stand. Come, come— 
we are over-patient.” 

The Honourable Tony sighed beatifically, as one 
whose cup of joy was full to overflowing. 

“Oh, come now, if you ask me, you’re dashed 
impatient. Shooting me down in this damn casual 
way—what d’you think the British Government’s 
going to make of it?” 

“Nothing,” replied the British Government’s 
loyal ally blandly. “Nothing whatsoever. Indue 
time the proper authorities will be informed that 
you were lost overboard on an expedition after 
crocodiles, and owing to the unfortunate proclivi¬ 
ties of those depraved reptiles, your body was not 
recovered. I do not imagine that the loss will af- 



326 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


diet the Government so deeply as you imagine.” 

The Honourable Tony’s manner changed 
abruptly from enchanted amusement to the cold 
insolence of a badly spoiled young man dismissing 
his valet. 

“And that’s enough,” he said. “Take your 
army and be off. You’re dashed amusing, but 
you overdo it. If an apology from you were worth 
the breath you draw, I’d have one out of you for 
the country that I represent and its representative. 
As it is, I give you fair warning to clear out; I’m 
about fed up.” 

“Till I count three to stand aside,” remarked 
His Imperial Majesty conversationally, abandon¬ 
ing the royal “we” as though it were no longer 
necessary in so informal a discussion, “I shall re¬ 
gret the bridge.” 

“You can count to three thousand if you can 
get that far,” the Honourable Tony informed him 
politely. “But while you’re about it you might 
remember that we’re in the twentieth century, not 
the Adelphi Theatre.” 

“We are in Asia,” said His Imperial Majesty. 
“Life is good, Excellency, and Death, I am told, is 
a long and dreary affair. The woman is not 
worth it—a gutter rat out of the music halls. 
It is her good fortune to amuse me. Stand aside, 
I beg!” 


THE HONOURABLE TONY 


327 


“My mother was from the music halls,” said the 
Honourable Tony. “I have half a mind to mop 
up the floor with you before I turn in.” 

“You are a brave man,” said His Imperial 
Majesty equably. “And a fool.” He turned to 
the black and emerald giants, and they quivered 
slightly. “Attention!” 

The giants ceased quivering and stood very 
straight. 

“Ready!” said Bhakdi softly. The pearl- 
handled automatics flashed like jewels. 

“Aim!” said Bhakdi with a flick of the handker¬ 
chief toward the slim figure framed in the door¬ 
way. 

“You ought to be jolly grateful to me for teach¬ 
ing you all those nice words,” remarked the figure 
reproachfully. “ They sound simply corking when 
you snap ’em out like that.” 

“I count,” said Bhakdi. “One.” 

“I wish you could see yourselves,” said the 
Honourable Tony admiringly. “For all the world 
like a lot of comic-opera pirates panting to get into 
the chorus when the tenor says ‘go.’ ‘For-I’m- 
the-big-bad-black-faced-chief’—you know the 
kind of thing.” 

“Two,” said Bhakdi. 

“I say, you are going it!” cried the British As- 
viser. In the gleam from the lanterns his hair 


328 THE HONOURABLE TONY 

was ruffled gold and his eyes black mischief. 
“Aren’t you afraid of its being a bit of a let-down 
to the Imperial Guard after all this?” 

“Three!” said Bhakdi, and he flicked the 
handkerchief again. “Fire!” 

There was a rip and a rattle of sound along the 
green line—from the other side of the bolted door . 
there came a faint reply, precise and sharp as an 
echo. The Honourable Tony sagged forward to 1 
his knees, still clutching at the handle, his face lit 
with an immense, an incredulous amazement. 

“By God!” he whispered. “By God, you’ve 
done it!” 

. And suddenly in the lean curve of his cheek the 
dimples danced once more, riotous and uncon¬ 
quered. 

“I say,” he murmured, “I say, Biddy, that’s— 
that’s a good one! Comic opera, what? That— 
that’s a good one—on me-” 

His fingers slipped from the door, and he was 
silent. 

THE END 







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